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My name is Morbidia DeSease. I live in San Jose also known as "Silicon Valley" also known as "silicone valleys" but mostly known as wannabe-San-Francisco-Bay-area. I’m 30-ish. I have an MFA in creative writing also known as a BFD. I do web pages for this tech firm in San Hoser where I live in this dope loft downtown with my roommate, Hypoxia, but I’m over at my beau’s crib (Tomb Jones) a lot. We three have just opened an art gallery with a bar, called "Les Fluers du Mal."
A lot of our customers at the gallery are these aging Baby Boomers (is that
redundant?) complaining about their kids and taxes, and they live in gated
condos with a weekend place in Humboldt County somewhere. So I suppose should
be glad and show them love and shit because they buy our stuff. Such as this
brass sculpture of two penises aimed upwards but flopped over. It’s called
"9/11."
It’s by Haarm DeBlogh (try saying that right the first time) and we wanted
$12,800.00 for it. I didn’t think we’d ever sell it unless some very wealthy,
very angry, very misandrist person took a liking to Hy, who could sell sand to
Sudan. When she’s not too drugged out.
So but anyway this guy Lincoln and his wife Cherie came in. Linc is bald on top
with a gray ponytail and Cher just recently cut her hair middle-age short and
their stomachs are the first thing in the room. I like them, really, I’m just
saying.
They usually they come in for a few drinks, but for different reasons: Linc has
a total hard-on for Hy. She has this little "just-between-you-n’-me" smile that
launches instant erections straight up. But Linc thinks, rightly, that Hy’s not
happening for him, so he flirts with me. Which is OK because he’s smart and
he's bought a couple of pieces from the gallery. So but anyway Linc made some
comment to Hy about how he liked her tongue piercing. Then Cher got mad, and
said in that middle-age menopausal roar, like, "You like it? You complain about
kids with piercings all the time. And tattoos."
And he said "Well that’s funny you were just complaining about ‘that fucking
noise’ on the radio when the Black Eyed Peas were up. You called it ‘rap
music.’ What’s that? Did you mean ‘hip-hop?’ " So this went on for a little
while and I got busy racking wine glasses pretending it was business as usual.
Jed and one of his Army buddies Demone came in and sat near the arguing elders
(if you're new to HB, Jed just got back from Iraq... he comes on like some
Southern White cracker but most of his friends are like Demone, from an Atlanta
ghetto). Jed and Demone didn’t seem to take any notice because they were
continuing some discussion they'd dragged in from the street.
Demone said to Jed, "No, serious business dude, why White cootchie stank?" But
before Jed answered, Linc sort of said over his shoulder "You got that right."
And that is why Cher bought the "9/11" penises.
But more to the point, you Boomers complain about hip-hop, you complain about
tats, but I Know What You Did Last Century.
You listened to Elton John and thought you were 'getting down.' As they say.
You wore platform shoes. You had a fro out beyond your shoulders. Or you had
bell-bottoms and put flowers on your class notebooks. You had a peace sign on
your butt. Far Out man. Your parents complained about your music and your
clothes (heya Fifty Cent, hey sag). Now you're bitching about capital gains tax
and voting Republican when you never even so much as joined the Peace Corps.
This is starting to sound like a rant. STFU time. Kisses, Mo.
Hy is getting stupid on her Army boy, Jed. Love. Yeah, biblical Jedediah, he's from some Red state like Arkansippi or whatever. Tomb doesn't like him because he's anti-military just on principle. Jed's sweet to Hy and I think their future is bright, so bright, I gotta wear shades. From the radiation blast when these two realize they're matter and anti-matter. Pasta and Antepasta. Bright like Orpheus and Eurydice. Don't make me explain that, you better know this if you're Goth. If you're not, in Ovid's Metamorphosis, Hades seduces Eurydice and he escorts her to the underworld. Orpheus, her love, goes on a mission to bring her back, he sings the three-headed guard-dog Cerberus to sleep (seriously, who let the dogs out? hee) and tries to save her. So but from the outside it looks that way, with Eurydice as Hypoxia, the dark dead girl from the sunless lands, and Jed the tanned, buff boy from some cotton orchard. A man on a mission. He's always making these creaky redneck jokes like "150,000 battered women a year and I've been eating mine plain the whole time?" or "If I'd known it would turn out like this I'd have picked my own cotton." Tomb got mad about it the first few times. The thing is, Jed's making fun of himself, really. Jed's like a private or "spec" or something, the lowest you can get in the Army. But he kicks it with us, we've all got college degrees and decent money and this art gallery is a hobby business. Some people have been frosting him out because he's got the buzz-cut and his grammar is a fucking train wreck for every sentence that leaves the station. So he's "at the bottom of the pile," as he says, everywhere he goes. I've seen him and his military buddies, they look like the UN, all black and brown and not much white, and he loves those guys better than family. But Hy's totally popular, and she and Jed are a four-legged, two-armed creature. Dilemma. Horns of. So but back to the bad jokes: Tomb realized Jed meant to be self-effacing and then got even madder, though he tried not to show it, because it was like he'd been out-ironied by this retarded peanut rancher. Tomb apologized to Jed, sort of, after I reminded Tomb about my no-trim-for-jerks policy. And Jed's been wearing black. One night after he read a poem he wrote (Hy edited it ) things started to change. So you see, Hy is Orpheus. She's trying to get Jed out of a world where creatures know nothing, suffer for a living and then die, all so that a much smaller, happier world above can be Small and Happy. Jed is Eurydice, he wants to have a family and a regular job and not get shot at and that's about it. Hy, like Eurydice, will look back as he follows her out, and that will forever trap him in His World.
The problem with goth is if you don't have a recognizable look then you're not-as-goth as moi. Thank God, or Satan or, actually thank Tim Burton because until he did Beetle Juice, an old movie about a married couple of ghosts trying to scare people out of their old house, goth was all Byron and Shelley and a few ex-punks tired of vomiting for entertainment who wore black velvet vests over their tired gear. These days goth is more like the Mexican Dia De Los Muertos, use a wedding dress, wear black-and-pink striped stockings, hair in pigtails. Any normal life scene, but dead. It's Perky goth. Actually, the problem isn't with goth looks. Say you're a girl in a wife-beater, your hair crew-cut and dyed pink, then you're butch. Or say you sag, got hilariously expensive sneakers, sign like an epileptic child, then you're gangsta. And that's just the clothes. Now tell me skin color doesn't matter?
There was a hummingbird poking into the yellow honeysuckle blossoms on my balcony this morning. And I thought how cool it would be if there were little bats, like goth hummingbirds: hummingbats. They could do Bach fugues instead of chirp-chirp. I wish I'd thought of it sooner, because "Fleurs du Mal" is so tired. So I had what the French call, "l'esprit d'escalier." (you think of a snappy thing to say too late) And then what the French call a "cri de coeur." (my heart cries) Then I wished I'd actually studied French so I wouldn't have to remember these Oscar Wilde dull razor bladicisms. I was engaged to a boy from France, that ought to give me some placement credit. His name was "Pascal" and he had an elephant nose (that means he was uncircumcised for all you non-Sex in the City watchers) ((and NO it's not a size analogy, just how it looks, take your foreskin-is-forearmed vs blind-mole-smegma tribal warfare somewhere else, little boys.)). I wander, sorry. So I saw this bat, I mean bird, and I wished we'd called our gallery (and website) Hummingbat. But it's too late because we've just put out big snap on signs and advertising. So I thought, as they say in Paris, "fuck it." So but anyway we're stuck with Fleurs but we got the web site name hummingbats because it was available, but not Fleurs. I told Tomb I'm going to do a few ads at some emo band shows, you know, emo kids are really just Goth pupae. But the people in our target art-buying demographic, OMFG, baby boomers. They're so old they're goth just by rising from their beds (or whatever they sleep in) for another day. But the artsy ones like having the emo/goth kids around, so really the kindergothen are like cheap, live decorations for us. Saturday
Opening night last night. It was great! Did some ecstasy, my feet are still a few inches above ground. We had a couple of newspaper people in and one of the National Public Radio reporters, an art reviewer or something ? dude's never seen himself in a mirror apparently, but smart and he liked our shit and especially wanted to climb up Hypoxia's legs. I don't blame him. Been there myself, unlike him. (X's & O's, Hypoxia baby!) So much to tell I won't get it all in and I have to get ready for tonight, too. But the short thing is we actually got some pieces sold, bar take was OK. The Bloody Marys with frozen meat chunks cubes totally upset a few people even thought we warned them up front (I had brown tofu for the vegans), plus someone said it might be a health code law, so WTF, there's another sysphean paperpush for me. BUT ? pee wee herman said everyone has a big but, and this is my big but: BUT those drinks made the cover of the Style section for Sunday's paper! Me Oui! Ja! Ora Le! Dobra! Mangil! Benissimo! Those are the only languages I know how to say "Yay!" in without looking it up. Tomb "TJ" Jones (maybe just "T"??) sez it's sexy, sprinkling language-y things, but when he's irritable it's just poseur. OK so but the best part was when Hy was hitting on these two guys, totally buff, short military hair, but plain Gap jeans and shirts with collars. They were Army guys on leave and were just looking for a beer, had no idea what Fleurs du Mal was. Hy is so the sharkette. She introduced them to a few people, the soldier boys were polite but also a little condescending, but not like agro about it. Like they're thinking, 'I could turn this bar into a parking lot with my bare hands, pale skinny art boys.' "If you'd seen the real shit, you wouldn't be doing this Count Drac haunted house stuff," one of them said. But he wasn't mean, it really was a question. And none of our stuff is so campy as that anyway. He meant the times with the screams and crawling half-bodies that him and his buddy laughed about. Laughs that seemed like psychological bandages more than comedy, to me. And Hy said Goth is not that literal. It's just a look. And she hooked her fish-net stockinged leg around the guy's knee, which made him crouch sort of, and she held his face and looked up into his eyes. "Hey, I like this place," the other guy said hoisting his Budweiser. Hy released him and said some other things about Elizabethan and French writings and a few bands, Nine Inch Nails and Rob Zombie, but he had already decided to agree with whatever it was she wanted him to agree with. The only thing that took those military dudes' cockiness down to hen-ness (Hy's guy said, "What do you call a female peacock? A peacunt." ) was when yet another military guy walked in. He was dressed in some decent black wool slacks and a tailored, cuffed, texture-needled deep violet shirt. Nice. I wanted to meet him. "Holy shit, that's our XO!" said Hy's new guard dog. "Your 'XO"?" Hy asked, "He's your hug & kiss boyfriend?" "XO ? Executive Officer. Damn, girl." he laughed. The man swept his eyes across the room without blinking, confident, now I really wanted to meet him. But he saw Hy's two guys, nodded to them and they responded, "Good evening, sir." And XO left without x's or o's. Anyway things went great and Hy took the US Government equipment home, both of them, which meant I had to stay with the Tomb since he didn't really want me over there with them. We had a little fight ? OK a big fight ? about whether he trusted me and why I should be able to stay in my own fucking place when I want to. Sunday 8/9 Damn, faded myself! No entries for three weeks. Sorry! I've been busy getting things ready for our opening. It's at the corner of 4th and Calaveras St. (means "skulls," cool!) we're calling it "Fleurs du Mal" you know, from the Baudelaire poems. He was doing Edgar Allen Poetry way before Poe did it. That was another big fight. TJ (what the fuck is a term of endearment for "Tomb Jones"???) wanted to call it "Self-Service Morgue" or "Drive-Thru Abortions" and was pulling rank on us since most of the cap is his. I said the people who'd like that kind of name are either too young to drink or can't tell kitsch from kitchen sinks. Hy had the best idea of all. She suggested "Not Sick But Not Well." She shellacked her dead pet parakeet, the one she accidentally poisoned last month, and lay it on a red satin pillow in the bottom of the bird cage with some lights like little votive candles around it. It looked great. So but we settled on my suggestion with Hy's dead bird for a logo. Makes for a good clean graphic, too, check it out at www.hummingbat.net. The part no one gets about Goth is how much time it takes to look that good, so sensuous and pale yet decayed. If you try too hard you just have schlock and bad old jokes. It's like the smell of a lover. Odors and tastes are warm and exciting and yet if it's some immeasurably small amount stronger it just fucking stinks. That's Hy's construct, BTW, she's always doing the sex metaphors.
--- Monday 7/27 Peeps! Doc got the snap for start-up expenses from a loan, so we're gonna hit it in like a few weeks, opening night! Sunday
So Doc aka Tomb Jones and Hy are getting serious about opening our own bar. They want it to be a regular bar with art showings. Hy's alien trend antennae are usually right, the timing's right, galleries with a wine bar are catching on with the artsy crowd just now, the employed ones anyway. (You know what the difference is between an artist and a 14-inch pizza? A 14-inch pizza can feed a family of four.) Here's my idea for the opening, they liked it, see what you think. I had this appendectomy last year and Tomb videotaped the surgery with close-ups of running blood and stretchy connective tissue being pulled out and cut, so it sort of snapped back into my abdomen with little spats of blood flying. So: I'll do our Grand Opening with video screens everywhere showing the appendectomy. And we'll have free Bloody Marys for everyone and put frozen meat chunks in them in for ice cubes. Sat. 7/18 Doc and Hypoxia are always hatching plans for us to have our own store. We were at Good Night and Hy was thinking we should have a tasting room boutique kind of shop for 20-somethings. Doc said he was going to change his name, make it Tomb Jones, which Hy likes, but I hate, but everyone agreed would be better for marketing. Hy is 28 and only drinks like Bud Lite and shit like that, and I don't know what sort of idiot would pay for a tasting flight of Budweiser, Coors, Miller and Schlitz. So this bunch of emo kids sitting next to us ordered nothing but that sort of thing and Hy and Doc were like, "See?" I'm thinking, damn, why not a Scotch Tape store? Jesus, just fucking shoot me now. Maybe they'll forget about it when the speed wears off. Thursday
7/16 Hypoxia got in an argument with my beau. It started about the president's twins, Jenna and Not-Jenna, but first Hy kind of started it with suggesting beau change his name. See, He started off with Doctor Shredder when he was with the Bone Saws. But now he's programming for a bank. And of course everyone shortened it to "Doc Shredder" which is basically an office supply. Might as well call yourself "Staple Remover." I think just "Doc" would do, he's so smart and creative, he makes me crazy. Anyway, Doc thinks Not-Jenna is definitely closeting the Goth look. She's got hook chains deep in her eyes and a riding crop belongs between those Wicked-Witch-of-the-Midwest lips. And she's the only one in the family that understands the books she reads in school. Hypoxia said there's nothing Goth about napalming kids in Fallujah slums. Although everyone had to agree the charred bodies, oozing and with bright pink cracks, was Goth-themed material in some way, still, the goal is beauty. And that shit is just evil with a PR account. Tuesday
7/13 My room-mate Hypoxia used some of the paint on her bird cage floor. She's tired of cleaning it up so she thought she'd paint over the bird shit with it real quick and plus, she said, it will look like that sound-proofing bumpy stuff they put on the walls in clubs like our favorite hangout "Gentle Good Night." If I have to explain the name to you, just go away. So we put the parakeet, Thrombosia, back in and then we went to Good Night for a few hours. We didn't really notice, but the next morning when this guy Hypoxia brought home, this really cute but totally straight type, the kind she likes to freak in bed, they always look their mind's been in a food processor the next morning, anyway, he said it was dead. And there it was, hanging upside down with its wings sorta half-out like it was just about to fly. Must have been the paint fumes. The guy said he noticed it was dead last night but he thought it was supposed to be that way. Like he so doesn't get it. Asshole. Goth is about beauty and art and how death and life are like Siamese twins. We look at the boundary layer, all the interesting stuff in the universe happens at the boundaries...geology where earth and water and air meet you get estuaries and beaches which have more life and death than any other place, or people interacting with people, going back and forth across their personal borders, living, loving, killing, birthing, dying. It's not about death. If you lived forever you might as well be dead and you could never prove you weren't dead. Saturday
7/11 So you know I've been looking for some decent nail polish and maybe eyeliner, too, that isn't totally permanent like a tat but doesn't come off overnight, either. I went into an auto body shop on 5th St that Hypoxia said she used to date sorta one of the desk guys. So but the only thing in there was this big beer belly with an old guy attached to it. He kind of turned in his chair and he gave me that up and down look that I like from cute guys, or not totally uncute, but from him it was a snot shower. I smiled this half-smile that looks like I'm all, "I know what you're thinking deep inside and It think it's cool," but really I'm like so playing this guy. So he's like, "Can I help you ma'am?" And I asked him about the kind of paint I wanted, could I have it for my project. "I'm an art student," I said. And then his eyes get soft and fatherly and I'm momentarily creeped wondering if my dad goes all lech sweet with girls and then this guy's like, "You remind me of my daughter. She's an art student, dresses kinda like that. More emo, though." So then I felt bad for totally projecting on this guy and I was thinking you can never tell what kind of people you're going to find inside a particular body. "Yeah," he said, "hey ? seen that" he points to my black lace parasol with the spider-web chiffon pattern. "My daughter's got one." I had to think, it was at a Sneaker Pimps show and my brain was rubber-band-stretched on some valium and speed at the time and I got the brolly from a vendor outside. Actually my beau, Doctor Shredder, might have got it. But that was no help so I said I didn't remember. So he took me outside and gave me a little detail brush and an unopened can of this beautiful black enamel that has a violet patina in the right light. "My daughter used it on her nails, if you don't mind curing it under a heater for an hour, a hair dryer works, it lasts forfuckingever." He pointed a finger at my chest, "Do not smoke near the can." I was a little bummed that the nail polish wasn't totally my idea, you know that whole emo-screamo thing is so derivative, but shit, whatever.
