| June
1, 2002
attunement
I was
poolside working on a raging case of melanoma when a couple of high school
girls I last saw in diapers claimed lounge chairs not twenty feet away.
To be clear, they were the ones wearing diapers, not I. I
sucked in my gut and whispered a silent prayer of thanks for clip-on shades.
Behind dark glasses, I could visually lick the girls clean of Bain de Soleil
without detaching both retinas. The girls glanced in my direction
as they peeled away their cover-ups. I smiled and started to speak,
but immediately realized they were glancing in my direction, as
distinguished from glancing at me. There were others inhabiting
my direction, including the lifeguard who was sleekly muscled and thirty
years my junior. I exhaled and resumed reading.
I found
it hard to concentrate on the novel I had brought to the Racquet Club pool.
I peered over the top of the book and watched the girls (Megan? Mandy?)
butter their flawless bodies. I would have been ashamed but for the
fact I had expended my shame reserves at two funerals the previous week.
Instead of properly paying respects to the dead motherfuckers bogarting
caskets at Johnson's Funeral Home, I stood in a corner enjoying the sexually-charged
atmosphere of the visitation parlors. The desire for companionship
is directly proportionate to the desire for solitude. The departure
of a soul causes existential fission and the energy released is, for me,
palpable. I am not proud of this attunement of mine, but there it
is. |