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| Lee Goldberg - No Rescue Yet |
What else could I expect on Analogue? I certainly am not steering it ...or...wouldn't I be going into known territory? I keep hearing a most joyful song about off and away in my beautiful balloon ---I can fly----so---I suppose---all is well and there is not danger ahead........
Mara - We are all alone in this experience.. it's certainly hopeless... and yet I feel that if I just project my thoughts MORE that a blockage will be overcome and breached. Wait, "What is that?" "Have I done it right?" The first weak plea escapes my mouth as a moan. "I AM enough! Please, please help me!" I yelled as I slipped further down the slope. I'm frightened, my eyes squeeze shut, tears leak out and run into my ears as the speed increases. "Why didn't I pack goggles," I think. Sharp pricks of ice pepper my face as I twist to avoid the worst of the onslaught. "This is not the Island of Stability I remembered," I thought more in images than words.
May 31, 2011
Mara - Now my butt is wet. "If this is the Island of Stability, what's up with the crumbling edge and the consequential pit I've fallen into?" The temperature had plummeted, and my tears had frozen on my face in a horizontal pattern caused by the speed I'd slid down the tube.
"The air is thin up here…..Perceptions take on a clarity not usual for our lives off the island."
As I scanned the walls of the tube I thought of the climbing crew… last I saw they were not climbing, but flying. "It has been a long time since a group hug, does anyone else miss that?" I wondered, "I need to complete this Note Tree note and find my friends", pausing I looked around expectantly but was not magically transported anywhere. "Shit. Shit, shit, shit", I hollered. "Double stinky creepy shit." I pounded my fists on the sides of the tube. From a fissure a glob slipped out and rolled down to land next to my right ankle. "Oh, THAT'S rich, a turd!" I moaned. "WTF… what am I missing?"
My magpie eye spotted the shine. Gingerly poking the turd with my figure a peradam topped key revealed itself. The key suspiciously looked like the rib cage from a mouse.
Lee - just as I thought all is lost and the balloon was breaching the time slit, I felt a jolt, then a push, then the balloon seemed to be reversing it's course. There was a breeze, gentle, then stronger, increasing to a very heavy gust, one after the other. I looked down and it was as though I was on the top of a tornado! It was coming from the other side, pushihg me back to where I'd come from (I think) at least I was no longer moving into that unknown universe beyond the slit. I could see all manner of things swirling beneath me. At first it felt like I was riding the crest of a wave, now the balloon began to spin. I grabed the bottom of the basket to avoid being thrown out..'holy crap' I shouted above the scream of the wind...'here I go again.
Lee Goldberg - The Mystery Wind Pushes Lee Back
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| Mark Bloch - Rescue by Owl |
Mara - I rested my face onto my hands thinking, "Really... this is just too much." With a deep breath, I looked up and saw a huge eye. Quickly slipping the "key" into my peradam (or peradamn, as that's how I felt) I rose, spontaneously, up towards the eye. "I don't want to end my life as a mote." I thought.
June 1, 2011
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| Mark Bloch - Eyes in the Sky |
June 2, 2011
Susan - My eyes must have been closed for quite a while, as the dizziness seemed to have subsided. I could feel the aftermath of the pain in my head from all that jerking around. Calmly, keeping my lashes shut, I used my hands gingerly groping around next to my body, hoping no one would be watching me. Soft, bouncy material expanded in my fingers. It was very spongy, but as I crawled my hands further along, it felt more like hard stones and straw. I slowly opened my baby greens and as I squinted, I carefully rotated my head. It was very dark except for the twinkling. Blue sparkling brilliance was pulsating wildly in a circle around me. As my eyes focused better, I realized I was the centre, the core. Surrounding me were about 50 lights, no wait, these were peradams! I cautiously tried to sit up feeling somewhat excited about this discovery. My body felt like it was still flying, I couldn’t quite feel all my parts yet. Numbness has set in from all that G force. Managing to sit cross-legged, and relatively steady, I took a deep breath as I gazed all around me, taking in the panoramic view. Mountaintops were surrounding me. I thought I could see outlines of air balloons in the distance, but the sky was so dark I was not sure if that was just wishful thinking caused by the dancing glows of the stones. I was on one of these majestic peaks. Alone, confined by magical crystals. I took a deep breath, and like ice running down my body, feeling dread, I realized I was possibly in a nest.
William Evertson - The Nest
Remembering, as my head was clearing, playing back to me the past events I knew, unmistakably this was an owl’s sanctum. I felt wind blowing hard towards me moving my body slightly off the ground as the noise of fluttering wings increased. The sound of a guitar strumming some blues flew into my ears. I waited!
Mark - "Urart Anatolia Aqarqi Luwian Boustrophedo Rongorongo Motifus Corpusi Jinci ....Urart Anatolia Aqarqi Luwian Boustrophedo Rongorongo Motifus Corpusi Jinci.... Urart Anatolia Aqarqi Luwian Boustrophedo Rongorongo Motifus Corpusi Jinci"
Ria - I heard some really weird mutterings, a latin mantra of sorts as I was trying to get a good focus on the owl. Woah! Up high by now, I could only discern a couple of baby greens (hey, I got damn good eyesight!) 'There's no end to this is there?" I asked Bill, who was not amused at my remark about owls palying with their food. "Bill," I spoke determined, "let's get some grip. Think! time slits are all around us, I think Mark is having a Latin breakdown or revelation in one of them. Time Slits Bill! Lets study them a bit before gallivanting into them like the others obviously do, lets use them to our advantage, for once, get this team together. Playtime's over! get that gps thingy out! I have a train to catch!"
Susan - "was that a train whistle i heard in the in wind... can't be....."
Lee - The last time I was in a balloon over Napa valley it was so peaceful, so quiet, this sure is not that. First the tornado time slit roar that pushed me back toward Mt.A. Then I heard the sound of flapping wings all around me; the wings of OWLS. So many owls that they were making the wind now guiding me back to the others...now...I'm hearing...urart anatolia aqarar luwian boustrophedo rongorongo motifus corpusi jinci....and it was being screamed by MARK from below the balloon and a gigantic owl.....well, at least I know he's close by but I'm not sure what to think about a rescurer that speaks in tongue.....maybe he needs the rescuing ?
A train? a train? now I'm hearing a train a comin' ? there are NO trains on Mt.A. so....where am I now? and where is everyone else?
Lee Goldberg - Train Station on Analogue?
William - Ria was pointing to Susan’s rucksack, which she must have abandoned when she decided playing with a giant owl might be fun. I started to rummage through it looking for her fortuneteller GPS paper thing.
“Damn,” I shouted, as I started throwing everything out in search of it. “Rope, mittens, harmonica, soup, a cow bell, half eaten tootsie roll, curling iron….geeze, she’s got more stuff in here than Felix’s magic bag.
“Probably at the bottom, we haven’t used it since Mulka,” Ria shot back. I continued, “Bottle of bubble bath, couple of road flares, Crayola set,” I shout back.
“How many colors?” Ria questions.
“A big one, 150 count at least, does it matter?
“No, just curious, what else?
I focus again, “ Let’s see, …waffle iron, train schedule…GPS.” She cuts me off, “Waffle iron? Train schedule. Give me those and the black crayon.”
Ria quickly looks over the schedule and shouts, “Not a minute to lose…run back and gather all the loose ends you can find.”
She turns and quickly sketches an elongated semi-circle on the rock wall behind us.
William Evertson - Ria's Tunnel
BillyRay and I load up loose ends and return as Ria gets some type of reading on the fortuneteller.
She points to the waffle iron and says, “layer those loose ends in there…make a short stack; we need to get higher or we’ll miss it!”
With Ria overseeing our waffling, BillyRay and I weave the loose ends onto the waffle iron and soon we have enough. We climb to the top of the rather impressive pile as Ria checks the GPS and the sun position and says, “Wait for it.”
Suddenly, I realize her semicircle is a tunnel; a brilliant siding off a time slit and finished none to soon because she shouts. “Right on time, the RVE”, as a monstrous locomotive pulls through and stops next to our stack.
Mark - What is this train schedule doing here I thought to myself. And why would this particular route, fare and departure time be circled? Who put this here? The notes had been flying around my tent, numbers everywhere, prime numbers, Fibonacci numbers. I could hear the voices outside my tent. This was the first time that Bill, Ria, Susan, Lee and I had been together at one campsite in such a long time. Things were feeling... well... together. That's when the Fibonacci numbers began to fly and the next thing you know I am in some sort of Gumby time warp if I remember correctly. The next thing I remember I was trying to piece together an explanation in my various logs and tables and books and now I find this train schedule. A train schedule! On a mountain! What kind of fuckery is this? Who put this here? I don't mind people rifling through my knapsack; it happens all the time. But no one ever touches my books. Nobody cares! Only Ria and half of these are hers. The "loaners" she calls them. Could SHE have put this here? No. She would have mentioned it . And she would not have looked in here without asking. Hmmm. Oh well.
Now what was I looking up again? Oh yeah Arquarar or Arkarare. Let's see... how would you pronounce that?
June 3, 2011
William - Caught like a flounder in the headlights, Fish N’ Boots stared at the massive machine that stopped inches from his dorsal. As Ria shouted, “Attention all passengers,” I quickly repacked Susan’s rucksack and tossed it and a large stockpile of the loose ends into the coal car. BillyRay seemed delighted and hopped aboard and launched into Love Train. Fish looked nervous and broke into a sweat deluge as Ria fixed her Medusa stare on him, “And where do you keep your ticket ?”
Ria Vanden Eynde - Climber RVE Wears the Issey Miyake Fall 2011 Collection While Climbing
I grabbed the little fellow and tossed him on, just as a blast of steam signaled our departure. Handing him a shovel I shouted over the whistle, “keep that coal coming like your life depends on it.”
He looked blankly at me, then Ria and said, “Is that like a rhetorical statement or euphemism or something?”
“Nevermind.” I grumble, “you work the whistle.” Taking the shovel back I began loading the furnace and building our steam.
Ria leaned in and said, “we’re going to need a lot of pressure; we’re way off script and it’s time to reverse the Root Cyclone™ technology that got us here.”
“I hear you sistah” and I pushed enough coal into the belly of the firebox to make it glow a fiery red. I heard her call, “Get on board or get out of the way!” and the mighty pistons began to power the wheels.
He looked blankly at me, then Ria and said, “Is that like a rhetorical statement or euphemism or something?”
“Nevermind.” I grumble, “you work the whistle.” Taking the shovel back I began loading the furnace and building our steam.
Ria leaned in and said, “we’re going to need a lot of pressure; we’re way off script and it’s time to reverse the Root Cyclone™ technology that got us here.”
“I hear you sistah” and I pushed enough coal into the belly of the firebox to make it glow a fiery red. I heard her call, “Get on board or get out of the way!” and the mighty pistons began to power the wheels.
Ria - oooooooooooooooooaaaaaawes
Susan Shulman - Ria Gathers Light Speed
Mark - As the speeding owl neared the basket of the balloon I could see Lee peering anxiously over the edge. I had been inexplicably chanting all the way through this amazing ascension and now, kind of coming out of my trance, I remembered something that seemed important and I doubt it was a coincidence: It was Bill that had originally mentioned Urart and Anatolia that day on the trail, Ria who told me about the Aqarqi measurement with regard to the Klein bottle, Luwian inscriptions was something Mara knew about and told me by the fire near Hut 3, Boustrophedo was a Lee concept about back and forth writing... something she drew a sketch of in my journal... and yes it was Susan who told me about Rongorongo and Rapa Nui. But when? And what is Motifus Corpusi? And Jinci? Wait wasn't Jinci the place I had seen a bridge in China? It was just before I came here. But where was I? Where am I? Oh yeah clinging to an owl's leg on Mount Analogue! Analogue. And now I was trying to get back to the balloon.... something was strange. I had been flitting in and out of time for days now... no years.... I felt so distracted... hadn't I just been in my tent?... no, Lee and I were looking at the mountain from above... the huts.... the two sides of the mountain.... the zig zag... No, I was in the vile... gotta focus....
William - The RVE picked up steam, BillyRay sang and Ria gazed intently ahead, her eyes on a small seam in the looming escarpment. I shoveled for all I was worth pushing the pressure gauge to its peg. We rode that machine into the wall pushing matter and light in all directions. Fish pulled the whistle but the sound was lost far behind. The darkness was overpowering, the RVE's headlamps illuminating only vast emptiness. A thin knife edge of light suddenly appeared and we bore down on it like a vortex from hell. Riding gossamer rails and expelling a huge volume of air ahead of us we passed through.
Fish looked out and said, "Is that a balloon on the cowcatcher?"
Mara - Intense buzzing assaulted itself into the eye of the storm with the express purpose, I briefly thought, to spit me into the grinding sound of an old but well cared for engine. This dream faded as reflexive avoidance brought me to a safe stop.
Ria - Right, I thought. Now a fish is gonna tell me what's up? Don't think so. Still, I did see a vague round shape exactly straight before us. Hey, I thought, that kinda like looks like Mark. I shouted at Billy Ray and the fish; at both, just to be sure, "Get that balloon line now! Get that line NOW! No stalling. If you miss it, they will be lost!" and rode the train like the devil, straight into time slit Cat.*89 #45.87
June 4, 2011
Mark - As the train rounded the turn we all took our seats. Lee was sitting with Bibiana and Mara to the left of the aisle. Bibiana was laughing and everytime she opened her mouth hot air balloons popped out adorned in the most beautiful colors and ornate handiwork. They were little minatures that floated to the top of the car we were in then out---right through the ceiling and up. We could see them collecting behind the train as we moved and organizing themselves in a straight line. Bill and Susan were seated across the aisle and were dusting themselves off from an intense performance. As for me, I returned to my seat behind Lee, Bibiana and Mara just as Mara shouted, pointing out the window, Hey isn't that Angela?
Mark Bloch - The Conductor
Just then the conductor came happily down the aisle and he stopped in front of us and we produced no tickets, he punched art we had made with his hole punch. "All aboard for the 21 century" he said. When Bill asked what he meant, he explained, "Veins of blue run through Mount Analogue - mined by the small blue squirrels and the mines are run by a band of green monkeys with wild eyes. The precious stones of the mountain are not unlike lapis lazuli of this world.
Because of the harsh work by generations of squirrels, the small animals are now a lovely shade of blue. Their world is quite dismal, their only pleasure being the nuts that they were paid for the precious blue stones mined from the depths of the mountain. Over the years some of the blues have escaped through the rip between worlds. The blues tried to avoid detection of the searchers that would come to round them up for their return to the blue mines on the other side. Occasionally the green monkeys would slip over to find special miners. But now you are here to change all that." We were all stunned but Lee spoke first, "Do you think we were sent here to save the squirrels?" And as the conductor turned to ge a better look at her, Ria blurted out, "you're not gonna tell me I have to chase after squirrels yet again? sheesh!!!!" To which Bill replied "Shhhhhhhhh!!!!" prompting her to shout even louder "choochoo train is riding, we'll be together together together!"
Christopher - "It's easy" exclaimed the conductor, "just let the balloons out the window and the squirrels will hop in and come back to Bibi; you just have to keep feeding her these holes I'm punching. The air will keep her balloons full, the only request is you protect them from the owls. The squirrels have been trying to protect the color blue (strangely enough it was the owls who prophesied the day when there would be little or no blue left). How the message got to me is to complicated to explain at this time, but I'll keep punching the holes and you keep giving em to Bibi and there might might be some hope for the world."
Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band - Mind Holes by YokoOno
William - BillyRay snapped out of his song at Ria’s voice and looked around for the balloon lines.
“In Susan’s rucksack, Hurry!”
As I shoveled, Billy grabbed it and with great effort dragged it off the coal pile and began pulling coils from it. His practiced hands made a lasso. He pitched it forward at the balloon caught on the cowcatcher but the velocity of the air pressure sent it flying back around my legs pulling me off balance. I fell to the floor with a crash. Fish poured water on my face as I sputtered, “What the hell are you doing.” With that sheepish look he has that drives me nuts (and not the self gathering type) he says, “That’s what they do in the movies.”
Ria grabs the rope and mutters something in Flemish under her breath; I know what she means without understanding the words. Glaring at BillyRay she adds, “Some cowboy, you throw like a girl.”
Spinning it fast enough to suck the yellow spectrum from Susan’s Crayola box she lets the storyline fly; handily snagging the balloon and begins arm over arm reeling it in.
I think I see a woman waving from the basket but Fish is pulling at my very wet sleeve. “You gotta see this, you gotta see,” he exclaims as he begins to tug me to the first passenger car. To my amazement I see passengers. Or maybe potential passengers because they are transparent….I mean they are there but not there.
Fish N’ Boots begins a jig, “What’s it mean, what’s it mean?
As I shoveled, Billy grabbed it and with great effort dragged it off the coal pile and began pulling coils from it. His practiced hands made a lasso. He pitched it forward at the balloon caught on the cowcatcher but the velocity of the air pressure sent it flying back around my legs pulling me off balance. I fell to the floor with a crash. Fish poured water on my face as I sputtered, “What the hell are you doing.” With that sheepish look he has that drives me nuts (and not the self gathering type) he says, “That’s what they do in the movies.”
Ria grabs the rope and mutters something in Flemish under her breath; I know what she means without understanding the words. Glaring at BillyRay she adds, “Some cowboy, you throw like a girl.”
Spinning it fast enough to suck the yellow spectrum from Susan’s Crayola box she lets the storyline fly; handily snagging the balloon and begins arm over arm reeling it in.
I think I see a woman waving from the basket but Fish is pulling at my very wet sleeve. “You gotta see this, you gotta see,” he exclaims as he begins to tug me to the first passenger car. To my amazement I see passengers. Or maybe potential passengers because they are transparent….I mean they are there but not there.
Fish N’ Boots begins a jig, “What’s it mean, what’s it mean?
Lee Goldberg - What's it Mean?
Susan - It is all quite hazy as I sit here on this seat, in this train, I think I am on a train, but I cannot quite think or see clearly as I drift back into my thoughts of my last memories before they disappear too.
A blurry and rippling creature of whites and blues whisked closer with extreme velocity, I was sure it would knock me off the cliff making this the final chapter of my adventures on Mount Analogue. I tried to grab onto the stones firmly as the debris from the nest started to swirl up into the sky. My legs had jack-knifed from under me and I was fluttering out of control a few feet in the air, thinking within seconds I would be sucked into the night vortex never to be found again.
Abruptly, I felt the surprising caress of feathers delicately holding me down on the nest. The air stopped billowing and it was then I realized I had a giant wing draped over my back keeping me still.
I gawked up at this enormous bird. His wide unmoving eyes were gazing into me. I sensed and understood his communication in my mind. “I have much to explain. There are ancient wisdoms and priceless treasures to impart to you and the searchers but so little time is left. We must start right away before they come! Before the end!”
Bibi - I could see all the confusion but I could not stop laughing and popping out balloons. I wanted to apologize to all as I felt my laugh was out of place and now we also had so many balloons floating all over us. We were still trying to understand why were they coming out from my mouth -*I* was still trying to understand that myself! Some tears started to come out from my eyes, as laughter continued to happen and more balloons kept popping out.
Mark - As I sped through the sky remembering the various parts of my mysterious mantra, I could clearly see Lee coming into focus. And there up in the sky behind the balloon she was in, was a giant visage of her left eye looking down at me.... but now....in fast motion.... that morphed into the eye of.... was it.... Sammy Davis Junior!!!!! Suddenly it all came rushing back to me! I had come up with the mantra myself as I walked along the trail with Sue Three and Ria so I would remember this moment: I had to quickly arrange my body into the proper position so that when I hit the balloon I would make just the right shape. I pulled my legs toward me and carefully let go of the owl's foot with my right hand which was holding on pretty damn tight! I had practiced this a thousand times with the squirrels. I could see Lee reaching out to grab me as I neared her but little did she know I was about to fly right by! The poor thing! Oh jeez! This was nerve wracking. I was not a happy....camper.
Mark Bloch - The Shape I'm In
June 5, 2011
Christopher - An owl landed in my window of the train, and seemed to say, this is all a dream, as if my reality could be reduced to a psychological stand point, Just then Mark with a Babe Ruth stance pointed out the window, William threw him a bat (the animal) and the owl went flying. Lee reported on the validity of a pataphorical thinking, and I remembered that Mt Analogue is the Unus Mundus, and all these echoes of synchronicity are more like proof then doubts, I looked over to Bibi who just kept laughing and somehow knew we would be ok.
Mark - As the peak of the mountain emerged out of the fog, the conductor explained "Mt. Analogue is about man's escape from the prison of his robotic egotistical self." To which Mara abruptly replied "Hey we are experiencing THE HEIGHTS OF SELF KNOWLEDGE here!!!!!" The conductor calmly retorted, "Daumal said the mountain is 'the path uniting earth and heaven.'" Then he added sternly with a knowing sneer out of the corner of his eye, "IT IS THE WAY THE DIVINE REVEALS ITSELF TO MAN."
Bill said Daumal was no theorist. "He was a natural in the mountains and a quick learner. He learned from his brother Jack." Christopher (the conductor) replied, "Yes, and in 1939 and '40 Daumal had TB and the doctors recommended mountain air but no more climbing." By 41 he was working on Munt Analog the book but did you know he also wrote an essay that year about poets of the 25th Century?"
Mara - I landed softly on something dry and crinkly. The noise organized itself into an engine winding out in 2nd gear. Looking forward through a windshield I saw a station with huffing trains, landing air vehicles along with the scurry of squirrels and other animals wearing various items of clothing and carrying valises. The driver turned around and gave me a fishy stare, "Mind you don't bend the postcards," he said, stopping neatly beside the waiting train. I tossed a bag of mail over my shoulder and staggered gracelessly over to the passenger car. "Ticket!" the conductor exclaimed. "Here it is," I hummed, and the notes of my answer drifted upward and entered the passenger window. "It's Mara!" I heard in chorus. The familiar voices warmed me to my toes. "Here you go, UP," said the conductor as he punched my exhaled note and tossed the confetti like piece over to Bibi.
"OMG Here you are!" I felt teary and happy and, as I sat, increasingly hungry and tired. "Look everyone, I have a letter for us all." At that moment a giant eye looked up from the evening paper and glowered....
June 6, 2011
William - I was transfixed at the sight of the addition of passenger cars to the RVE. They hadn’t been there when we left. Now cars loomed behind us like endless mirror reflections. The cars pulsed, elongated seeming to stop and then gently rippled like gentle waves in a vast sea back into formation. There was laughter and jostling, as Bibi seemed to blow bubbles of some sort. During an elongation, I clearly glimpsed Mara board from a station.
Looking forward I saw the scenery rush by in a blur, I think it’s scenery but the speed makes everything looks like pulses. Movement and simultaneous still points!!
The still point was here in the cab as I saw Ria helping Lee aboard.
Lee seemed entirely nonplussed at seeing herself already in one of the rear cars having tea and enjoying the lively conversations.
“I think I’ll join myself,” she exclaimed as she scooted past the coal tender and disappeared into the dining car taking on the wavy transparent look of the rest.
Mark - As Lee claimed her (second) seat, and Mara fiddled with her paper, Christopher turned to look at Susan who was becoming increasingly uneasy from all this chattering and he said, "I have come to tell you that YOU are the poets of the 25th century! You may not remember it but Daumal sent you here to do his dirty work for him because he knew he was going to die."
Susan - I am trying to speak, but my words are cutting in and out like a bad short wave radio with all the interference, moving from one channel to another. “It is critical you grasp what I am saying.” I yell. In an instant I cup my ears with the palms of my cold hands to dim the pitch that is hurting my brain. I am appearing and disappearing at great velocity and momentum that I cannot focus very well on anything. I am a staccato strobe. I see Chris pointing, then he’s vanishes. I see Mara, but in a blink she becomes transparent and I only see a tea cup floating. Am I a mirage? Flashes of Bill and Ria…darkness again. Twinkling in my vision. Yohooooo Mark, man……look here!
I am sitting on this red seat! BIbbbbbb echoing her name in my head…”hello…do you see me, does anyone hear me?”
The still point was here in the cab as I saw Ria helping Lee aboard.
Lee seemed entirely nonplussed at seeing herself already in one of the rear cars having tea and enjoying the lively conversations.
“I think I’ll join myself,” she exclaimed as she scooted past the coal tender and disappeared into the dining car taking on the wavy transparent look of the rest.
Mark - As Lee claimed her (second) seat, and Mara fiddled with her paper, Christopher turned to look at Susan who was becoming increasingly uneasy from all this chattering and he said, "I have come to tell you that YOU are the poets of the 25th century! You may not remember it but Daumal sent you here to do his dirty work for him because he knew he was going to die."
Susan - I am trying to speak, but my words are cutting in and out like a bad short wave radio with all the interference, moving from one channel to another. “It is critical you grasp what I am saying.” I yell. In an instant I cup my ears with the palms of my cold hands to dim the pitch that is hurting my brain. I am appearing and disappearing at great velocity and momentum that I cannot focus very well on anything. I am a staccato strobe. I see Chris pointing, then he’s vanishes. I see Mara, but in a blink she becomes transparent and I only see a tea cup floating. Am I a mirage? Flashes of Bill and Ria…darkness again. Twinkling in my vision. Yohooooo Mark, man……look here!
I am sitting on this red seat! BIbbbbbb echoing her name in my head…”hello…do you see me, does anyone hear me?”
June 7, 2011
Mark - Christopher asked the Kali Cuties to accompany him which they gladly did. With Mark and Mara and Lee looking on, Chris removed his conductor hat and later his conductor blazer as he asked the band to back him up on an old blues song...I was born in Chicago in nineteen and forty-one
I was born in Chicago in nineteen and forty-one
Well, my father told me, "Son, you had better get a gun"
Well, my first friend went down when I was seventeen years old
Well, my first friend went down when I was seventeen years old
Well, there's one thing I could say about that boy, "You gotta go"
Well, my second friend went down when I was twenty one years, baby
Well, my second friend went down when I was twenty one years, baby
Well, there's one thing I could say about that boy, "You got it babe"
Well, my blues are alright if there's someone left to play the game
Well, my blues are alright if there's someone left to play the game
Well my rules are alright if there's someone left to play the game.
Oh, they just don't seem the same, baby
June 8, 2011
William - Ria returned to the gauges and gave them a tap; grimacing to see that apparently we weren't at full velocity. I, in turn tapped her on the shoulder, "you realize that we are in the back giving a concert." She glanced back, shrugged and said, "not possible; I can't carry a tune."
"Um....looks like backing vocals to me," I ventured. She grabbed a handful of loose ends and threw them on top of the coals, then looking back she turned her pockets inside out and said, "nope..no royalty checks..not possible."
"But look behind us, maybe it's the past, maybe it happened already."
Fish N'Boots cut me off and said, "there is a maximum speed that anything can get through space/time. If a photon has more energy than required (and they all do), then there is a back up while waiting for the next present moment. Your seeing potential waiting to happen"
I looked at his legs then into the one eye facing me and thought to myself, Damn this evolution tsuff can happen fast.
Susan - As I was whirling around, dancing uncontrollably like a Dervish, my red strips started to shift and unravel all over Bill, Ria and Chris, then recklessly uncoiling downs the aisles like a snake in search of freedom. My momentum was building, aiming to reach the source of all perfection, or kemal as explained by Sufis. I knew from my studies that this occurred through abandoning one's egos or personal desires or in my case by listening to certain music. Oh, "Born in Chicago" always did this to me. “No, not here, not now when I am so close in explaining everything” I muttered out loud. As I continued to spin my body in endless circles, which, has been seen as a symbolic imitation of planets in the Solar System orbiting the sun. I knew what was about to occur. It always does when I hear "The Butterfield Blues" band. “Wait, I want this gig”
All I saw was blue blurs of colors. I shimmered brilliantly and vanished!
Mark - Sue Two disappeared into the ether. Her double Susan innocently stepped from the back of the car where she had been exploring the rest of the train with Bibiana who was still giggling and releasing balloons in remarkable fractal like patterns through the roof and up. "Up up and away!" said Lee, "get in here right away, Susan we seem to have lost a member of the band and they are finishing up!" Lee was right and as Susan and Ria joined the band for the final verse, The conductor retrieved his hat and jacket and began explaining again. "And so you see it was 2441 when Daumal sent you all here, hurling back in time and space exactly 500 years to the second for the purpose of rescuing the squirrels from the oppressive green monkeys. Only ripping the lid off of Mount analogue itself could save them and--" Susan interrupted him "it's the prophecy! I was right all along. Does that mean Mark is--" Christopher calmly continued. "You are from the 25th century but Mark is not. In fact Mark doesn't really exist at all. At least not yet. He was just made up by you and Doctor Moony who was born in 1941, just like the song says and in 1941 when he began his quest for someone to serve as your proxy when it was time to save the squirrels, he chose Mark. "So we really ARE here just to save those fucking squirrels? It doesn't seem fair!" muttered Ria in a strange dialect. Bill smiled at her and handed her a clump of photons and searched in his rucksack for her waffle iron.
June 9, 2011
Susan Shulman - The Scribe
Susan - I carefully added the final touches of liquid gold to the curly serif tail in the number two with my smudged fingers. They glowed from the burnishing. Yes, 1442, the final mark to date my creation forever. This was going to be a magnificent looking manuscript with so much ornamentation. I remember when I started it. When that odd man came to visit me in my atelier. I didn’t believe him, professing he was a time traveler. But, the more I listened and questioned his stories, the more I knew he was authentic. I looked down at the colour images illustrated on the vellum on my worn wooden table. This material is much better than the sheepskin I used to use. This book was my finest creation. “The Haggadah of Mount Analogue”. I slowly scanned some pages, my eyes smiled at the images of beautiful blue squirrels, green goats and owls in the margins around each page. I intertwined those twelve strange artists, climbing the mountain to find nirvana with constellations and astrological signs. Yes, and of course I inscribed the birth today for Bibianna. A huge celebration! Last week the one called Mara rejoiced with a new grandchild. “Why Me? How did he find me? How did he know?” I sang my questions out loud. I presumed when I flickered out from that train. I could return to my world to be left in solitude. It always commanded so much energy to maintain that hologram on the mountain. That was the danger. Never knowing when I would become transparent and they would notice. It was not, in reality, much easier in this century, choosing the life of an artisan. Fortunately I lived here at the monastery in the mountains, allowing me a simple life where I wrote and illuminated manuscripts. The brothers supplied me with the finest pigments and brushes that were attainable by the wealth of the Church and Monarchy. I kept my silver and gold powder well hidden. The other colours were in plain sight casually displayed on the shelves behind me, but no one would inspect or detect them, for they blended well with the other herbs and dried fruits. But, if they witnessed me sprinkling and grinding them into the waxy liquids, I imagine it would seem like magic or sorcery. The monks knew that I created this Haggadah and only here I am liberated. Free to be a woman artist, unattached, who is not branded as a heretic. Father William had been the monk who completed the over sewing and gluing in all my books with his signature marks well hidden within the spine. His skills were known all over the land as well as his outfit. He was the only brother who wore a silk tunic with shadow puppets etched into the fabric.
I knew that after I completed my creation, I had to hide it. The traveler claimed that this book be buried until the year 2441, when all that has been penned will be revealed to those who are ready.
I knew that after I completed my creation, I had to hide it. The traveler claimed that this book be buried until the year 2441, when all that has been penned will be revealed to those who are ready.
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