Wear that funny hat, be bold, Brain on a rhyming kick. Ernest preparing for a stroll to work, Advanced Marketing Tech on the Avenue. If he gets fired Rosa will kill him. His one day if all things go right soon to be you would think mother-in-law will chalk him up as unsuitable. Such determination would spell death, the end of things. Can you imagine? The guy musters the money for a flight to St. Louis, arranges some dinner date for Mother, waxes with Scandinavian DNA about the love he has for her, undying devotion till the end of days; and this woman looks at him, perhaps there’s a tear, and says, “I won’t allow it. Do what you must, but you do not have my blessing.” Soul Crush, a band.
If he gets fired. Why? Are there issues? Well, for one, he didn’t make his two hundred calls to bookstores around the country see if they received their fliers thank them for doing business with Advanced Marketing Tech, visit us on the web. He “made an executive decision,” and determined that the calls were worthless from a bottom line standpoint, and he began calling every third on the list, eventually reading the New York Times, emailing his brother a long letter reading the three incoming, pacing around the office, standing over the space heater, watching the clock, shooting the shoot with the FedEx, then leaving. Of course, you know boss out of town.
Therefore, he carries worry as he places the silly hat on his head. It’s not silly as in flowers and see-through plastic, grandmother’s beach hat, or silly as in flies and hooks a-dangle fly-fisherman’s. It’s silly in the cowboy hat meets Crocodile Dundee, wide brim where’s the long leather trench bro sort of hat. Doesn’t bother him so much. But feels he must flex his jaw, clenching teeth, make muscles seem taut and strong.
If he gets fired that is the end of it. Rosa will kill him then boot lifeless body out the door. Sure of it. And the R and all of the rest? Say so long. And a B? Out of the question. How does he do it, this growing up? Come on, Ernest, feel the stakes, aware of the stakes. You must now never lose your job.
Brain sounds like his mother. Brain, after Ernest places hat on hair and head, makes fun of him, makes him feel self-conscious, injects problems into his mind. Here the dance of time.
Pason upstairs. Pason directly above their apartment, across the hall from dancing-prancing Tammy and Levi, in front of Diane Hellenback, trying so hard. He’s down with bicycles. Poor guy works. Pason has a girlfriend. They started slowly, pretending they enjoyed casual sex. Now they live together. Roothie pregnant. Rosa will despise her even more. Roothie a lawyer defends corporations. Pason white and Roothie orange.
No, no, don’t worry, I’ll properly introduce you. You will meet Pason and Roothie. We will have a fine, happy moment. [Ernest’s father asking, “Son, what exactly is happiness? Ernest mumble, call on something about money, peace of mind and long walks in the woods.] Meanwhile, certainly, she sleeps over all the time and has come to like bicycles. They wear the gear: helmet and Lycra and racing-team jerseys, she on Saturdays and he to work. And you should hear them on their indoor pedal machine. Ernest below rests on grandmother’s sofa, what do you say?, oh yes, fit to be tied.
Yes, and, there will be The Obso King, the Observer of All Things, who rides in town his funny bicycle. And a small tale about a blue corduroy cap that spins. Cannot help itself. The way of things. With the commingling of magic and crime the blue cap ends up in Pason and Roothie’s apartment, having begun there, after having experienced an incredible journey Out There, in the world, mixing with Floyd the Drunk and the Obso King and his gang and his wife, the wet or dry streets of Oakland and a girl in red wagon playtime with dog. The blue cap spins and it’s the way of all things. Say hello to the bouncing rhythm.
About Roothie being orange you asked me, perhaps perturbed, “What do you mean?”
What do you mean ‘what do you mean’? I mean that Roothie is orange. Part Asian part Native American, went to Harvard Law School straight out of San Leandro and to call her yellow or red would be wrong: bears tint of orange. Therefore, see this orange woman walking down the street, whether in Cambridge or in Berkeley you see her, wearing leather jackets, slim skirts, hair blonde and jounce. I see it you see it we all see our friend Roothie.
Ernest fit to be tied, sitting in the apartment below Pason and Roothie. Roothie going nuts on a rainy day: she rides indoors. Not Peloton crazy, no online community. Rather, bike attached to contraption with a spinning wheel, and you ride and ride and sweat and ride. Only thing is, the entire small yellow house shakes and groans. More a freight train rolling past your home, more than subway. Constant drone, shaking humming drone, grinding. Ernest attempting to listen to radio jazz and read one page from a book. Can do neither. And so he listens, and hears the wheel representing groaning, grinding sweat, human toil and ultimate hamster. Go, woman, go. Ernest listens to pedals turning wheel turning contraption spinning groaning, screaming, whole yellow house shaking. He meditates on hamsters and indoor exercise and sweating humankind, always burning energy, forward momentum trying, perennial crying, dying. There radio jazz, but he can’t hear it. There’s a book for him but cannot concentrate. And he envisions himself as furry little hamster, spinning on his wheel, sights ahead on a prize, projection of prize, there it is on a velvet-lined shelf, behind thick bulletproof glass, rests on a spinning display a diamond R, three diamonds from a grandmother maybe, turning slowly. Ernest riding the hamster wheel; Ernest sweating; yellow house shaking.
Pason has a friend both film buff and movie critic who, as it stands, hates all the films he sees. He is a complainer. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have a name, other than reference to the Grouchy Movie Guy. The original owner of the blue spinning cap. Meet him when you receive the proper introduction to Pason and to Roothie and the Obso King. Grump who despises movies, and yet can’t stop watching in theaters indy or corporate or renting or streaming or sitting in living rooms talking about them interminably. Press him, do please press him, about his anti-film attitudes, and he will say, perhaps winning him over to us, “Look, I just want to see a good movie; to be wowed. Give me some quality, please, artwork with meaning.” This without pretension, like Freud on civilization; gives it to us with such vivid care and concern that we begin to question our own relationship to Hollywood, mass produced media-thons, Great Sells attempting to foretell Sizzle yet advertise Fizzle. The way of modern times to the end of trying. Pason and His Friend The Movie Grump and a blue corduroy cap, spinning on a finger on a rain soaked winter day, a tale told, one shared with you, one given.
In the morning NPR a radio alarm and the news not as bad as it could be. The Afghans have a coalition government and Homeland Security chief in America has issued a dire warning for the predominantly Christian holidays. A doubled-over oldschool Muslim cleric, some be-robed old man in Saudi Arabia, a land of princes and oil like water and accidental billions (one day to change if Rosa gets her way), claims holy war, a war of the Infidels against Islam, Christians versus Muslims, modern form of the Crusades. The American president on a horse with broadsword and shield, wearing mail ordering men into battle. These are exciting times and the times are trying.
The news is not as bad as it could perhaps be, and Rosa swings her legs over and her feet have yet to touch the floor when Ernest says, “Baby?”
“Yeah?”
“I think you should write a book called Stories of Muckrakers and Their Wives.”
Without missing squat or beat she answered, “You mean Stories of Muckrakers and Their Husbands.” Ernest says Oh, yeah; Ernest know better. Come on, boy, get your shit together.
Rosa the shower queen, never misses a day, blow-dries her hair and flings wet hair from her fingers to the wall.
Ernest notices a leak under the bathroom sink.
Rosa says, “Baby, will you take out the trash tonight?” He’s affirmative all over it.
Before he knows this or that, before he deals with his head the hat, before he becomes aware of it, Rosa gone to her day, outside and the cold and gray, out to save the world this time for sure, one step at a time, meeting people who force cops to stop harassing the populace, who make cops pay when some of their own kill innocents unarmed, who take cops to court. Rosa grabs bagels and flies down Broadway and heads toward the lake and they will discuss items and issues, community concerns, empowerment programs for city’s youth, the hungry and crying.