Fritz Weiss's Blog

Truth
suffers from too much analysis

yeah…so…I don’t know if you’ve heard…but my novel “Radioactive Zombie Apocalypse: A Durable Mutation” is now available digitally on iBook, and in the Kindle store at Amazon.com.

http://www.amazon.com/Radioactive-Zombie-Apocalypse-Mutation-ebook/dp/B008Y4TV0E/ref=sr_1_sc_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1345154763&sr=8-2-spell&keywords=Radioactie+Zombie+Apocalypse

That night she made it into the café right around 10:47.  The bell above the door chimed with a timbre only she was able to summon, just audible over the Pierre Henry on the world’s last CD player.  Ta-ching-ching-chingggg.  Rather than the Ta-chang that other, normal patrons triggered.  She was no other patron.  The 10:47 arrival meant she had left her Jackson Avenue apartment between 10:23 and 10:28.  Had the drizzle ceased she may have walked; her strolling across Jackson Ave, underneath the freeway underpass then over the canal’s walking bridge would have been a thing to behold; but the rain had moved in at sunset and continued through until the present, causing most pedestrians to become passengers.  She was no normal passenger. 

            The streets would have benefited from her walk.  The leaves obscuring the stop lines and crosswalks would have danced in front of her steps rather than gusting into the storm drains.  The porch lights would have brightened at her approach, beckoning her up their steps, hoping that she would ring their bell, entering their residences for some kind of nightcap; rather they remained motion detecting burglar repellents.  The parked cars would have looked like silent print ads in a magazine as she walked by, beckoning the would-be consumers to a new magical life.  Had she walked to the café taking the most direct route using the underpass, her entrance into the tunnel would have transformed the utilitarian 70 feet of U-shaped gray into Alice’s rabbit hole; those who had the good fortune to pass through with her being whisked along as in a row boat built for two.  Perhaps the world on the other side would be like one found in the magazines: The streets reflective with wet footsteps like happy memories; everyone gainfully employed in those cool creatively hip, yet lucrative jobs where they wear suits jackets, retro spectacles and sneakers.  Even the café employees are hip in that world.

            In this world she continued walking towards her destination.  That’s not right.  Tonight she hadn’t walked.  There wasn’t enough rain on the shoulders of her coat, its belt cinched around her small waist, filled with possibilities.  The bus had delivered her.  Perhaps she’d graced the other riders with her sincere yet subtle smile.  She preferred the latter half of the bus, and those who rode with her behind the reticulation would have been indulged by her a scent of water and French soap cutting through their menial filth and normalcy. 

            She would have opened her current composition book and read over what she had written – composed – the night before.  Earbuds keeping unworthy clamor, conversations and suitors at bay.  For the last few weeks the comp books had the Red Versioned Rorschach covers.  She kept no pattern to which of these she used, and apparently no preference.  Other poets and writers will extoll the virtues of certain pens or qualities of heavy bound paper.  They insist on having their writing station “just-so” as though they cannot approach their work without kicking and screaming.  Not her.  She could write anywhere.  No special pens required.  No 40 pound paper.  No walls covered in cork.  Just a comp book delicately on her knee, and whichever pen she was able to coax out of the bottom of her shoulder slung bag.  The pen would linger between her fingers as she tucked the one mischievous strand of hair behind her ear.  Once coiffed she would begin writing as though no one were watching. 

            She was not self-conscious.  She was not insecure.  She didn’t let the people tell her what she could or couldn’t do.  She probably understood pain, but she had never experienced it.  Emotionally.  She did not have “certain events” in her past that she was “working out.”  But she was okay with people who did.  She meant it when she smiled, even if she didn’t really know you, even if you didn’t deserve it.  She would give you a chance if you wanted to risk walking up to her and starting the conversation that had been transpiring in your head ever since she had started coming into the café. 

            Ever since I had seen her.  But this isn’t about that. Not yet it’s not.  

Forgiving the orange spray-on tan, the black-root blonde perm, pressed-on fingernails and cheap high heels juxtaposed against a mismatched sweat suit revealing a butterfly tramp stamp, one would claim her to be like all the other grandmas at the park’s playground.

Why does Luke get all the love?  What did he really do other than react to a certain situation?  Had it not been for the ambition of his confused father, and other overzealous politicians, Luke would have seen nothing other than the sands of Tantooine.   Bond, James Bond would have been nothing more than a petri dish for the clap without the likes of Blofeld, Dr. No, Goldfinger, and all the others.

The lone Hero is a lie.  They are reactive after thoughts, only brought into being when certain individual’s world changing ideas take a turn to the wicked.  Without these villains, the supposed Heroes would never have known greatness.  More realistically their lives would have remained unmentionable.

               
Without Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker would have been stuck as a Nerfherder in the middle of nowhere, long long ago.


    
If not for Hans Gruber,  John McClane would be just another failed cop, who had to watch his wife Holly get boned by some schmuck from accounting at the Nakitomi holiday party.


    
Bill loved The Bride.  Who hasn’t been driven crazy by a dame on her way out the door?


    
 All the bond villains.  This is a big one…Bond never would have landed 1% of the strange pussy that he did, nor at a caliber close to who shows up on screen.  He would have ended up a mid-level clerk somewhere in the British government, with a whole bunch of illegitimate kids running around asking for money for chips.


    
 The Wicked Witch of the West was only reacting to the murder of her sister.  Had Dorothy’s house not landed where it did, she would never have had to find Oz.    Dorothy  would have been stuck with the munchkins, and after a while I’m sure she would have grown weary of reaching for the sugar on the top shelf, and probably would have started   experimenting with the various different herbs, plants and fungi found in this new colorful land.

What do these villains have in common?  They aspired to be bigger than society deemed normal.  None of them was going to be satisfied with a menial cubicle or some quaint little castle keep by a babbling brook.  They all strived to change their world or universe.  Yes yes even if murdering millions of innocents was a necessary step, I get that it’s “bad” to commit acts like that.  Had it not been for their wickedness though, what may have been?

1)      Darth Vader – He did get the entire universe on the same schedule.

2)      Hans Gruber – A financial genius who knew how to motivate his team members.

3)      Bill – Thought outside the box, and never took “No” for an answer.  Bridged all sorts of different cultures.

4)      Bond Villains – Are any of these guys really that different from modern day CEOs and Politicians?

5)      Wicked Witch of the West – An Equal Opportunity Employer who was extremely loyal to family.  Some could argue that Dorothy was just as wicked.

My point?  Heroes are only so when they are faced with an enemy of extraordinary caliber.  Without dark no light…blah blah blah.  All these villains strive to change the world.  When’s the last time you attempted anything that outrageous?

M:          I just wanted to come over and congratulate you on your endorsement.

H:           ?

M:          I say, I just wanted to come over and acknowledge your virulence, expertise and/or over all moxie.

H:           ??

M:          I mean, it absolutely shows, your better-than-thou demeanor has most assuredly  realized tangible dividends for you.

H:           ?…?

M:          What’s that you say?  These clothes weren’t given to you under some contractual pretenses outlying the frequency in which  you must wear them?  No matter.  There’s something intoxicating about this whole scenario.  I want to emulate you.  I want to be you, think you.  I can only hope that it’s as easy as it seems. To don the ubiquitous uniform of the chosen, and therefore be chosen.  I wonder if my Puma sneaks,  Adidas athletic trousers, Puma t-shirt with the arms cut off will hang as well from my frame as they do yours.  Is it this that the companies want to accomplish in having their swag so represented by you and your kind?  I haven’t seen any evidence of what else it would be.  The screen on your properly propped iPad has not left the homepage since I began observing you.  You’ve made calls on the duly connected iPhone but as far as I can tell have only left messages.  No one has answered your calls, most likely cause they don’t know you’re in uniform.  Yes I understand this isn’t the only uniform that exists; there are others for other tribes.  Right now I’m looking at you.  Do you know what it is you do?  Did you make the choice for the performance and feel at your local hunting ground gym; or is this to emulate others?  I expect that latter.  The irony is that since you have so chosen to expose your physique it is easy to see the lack of tone or  regime.  Is that why you keep your sunglasses on?  I can’t imagine the coffee shop’s luminescence is that blinding.   It’s not for me, I can see more clearly than most would wish.  I see the truth in your masquerade.  The faux leather bound organizer with the unmarked appointment calendar.  The constant trips  to the lavatory… how is it that you keep returning so quickly?  You can’t constantly be checking your hair, there’s not enough there for the Starbuck’s generated cyclone to muss.  Is it that your triple espresso shot has done its work too quickly?  Do I detect you blinking behind those cloudy-day sunglasses?  Do the questions make you nervous?  Hey!  Focus on me, not the young girl whose leopard print shirt matches her lap-top’s carrying case.  What the fuck?  Where am I?  I gotta get the fuck out of here.

H:     …

Danger Mouse  – Two Against One (feat. Jack White)

Testing spotify’s new blog feature…

“There is nothing heavier than compassion. Not even one’s own pain weighs so heavy as the pain one feels for someone, for someone, pain intensified by the imagination and prolonged by a hundred echos.”     Milan Kundera

Word spread.  As words are wont to do.

I think about them.  They had been on the playground, in the hallways, parking lots – both large and small, public swimming pools, libraries, freeways, sidewalks, high school Friday night football games, the checkout lines in middle of nowhere markets where both the patrons and the employees deserved it; countless other unremarkable, commonplace settings populated with THEM.  Without ever knowing them, I had hated them.  ‘Hate’ is too strong; I wouldn’t waste the passion on them.  I had seen myself as better than them.  They were ugly, too vain, fat, too stupid, unworthy of love or laughter.  Through my eyes their friends didn’t really like them, and their parents were perpetually oblivious to the disappointment that they had created by the hungerless fumbling in the dark.  Did I want them to kowtow to me? No.  Rather I wanted the others, those worthy of my love and laughter to approve of my thoughts.  Together we could sit in the sidewalk cafes, inside the velvet ropes of the exclusive club, behind the air-conditioned tinted windows of our magazine-clean automobiles and think our silent thoughts about them.  Derision passed with the twitch of an eye. 

Years later now, I think about them.  They dare not think about me.  Not now.  Not after all that I have become.  All that I have achieved:  My marks were the highest, my opinions the most sound, my choicest the finest.  My scowl and stressed brow keep them from approaching me.  My perfectly pressed expensive clothes keep them from competing with me.  My quips, retorts, silent sighs and cold shoulders keep them from conversing with me. 

Now I search them out.  Through their photos and comments, eavesdropping on their conversations, peering secretly at their absurd text messages and other communiqués which they have left open for the world to see, I see the truth.  I was right.  I alone was right.  The doubt and small vestige of guilt is driven away as I see that in my seclusion I am right.