IS ENVIRONMENTALISM THE NEW RELIGION?
I was talking with a friend yesterday about such matters, and I was struck by the extent to which she sounded like a doomsayer. Concerning the ozone layer, she stressed that if we did not repent (stop burning fossil fuels) then we would live to see fire come down from the heavens (global warming) and the seas would rise to drown all but the faithful (actually, they're going to get it too).
It's all probably true, but it still seems straight out of the Book of Revelations. The sin here is materialism and greed: Avarice.
I had more weird dreams last night. In the first one, my room began to collapse around me, and I could hear studs snapping and rusty old nails screaming as they're wrenched from dry wood. I sprang from my bed and out the back door, like as if I'd accidentaly spooned a cobra... But as I regained consciousness, the room seemed to be its old crooked self. Still, I searched the walls for new cracks; it would be another hour before I could get back to sleep after that.
In round II I dreamed that Brad had come down from oakland to help me form out the foundation, only he'd brought with him this real asshole of a guy wo he called his "helper". He said I'd be billed $75/hr for the guy's work, which I wanted to protest, but it seemed to make more sense to just play it cool and get the foundation finished.
Then the two of them started randomly pouring cement slabs all over the backyard. That's when I told them to get the fuck out. In the dream I coul;dn't believe Brad would do such a number on me... But then i was also struck with the sense that nothing is so surprising anymore. That must have been real life bleeding into the dreamworld, instead of the other way around - which is how it usually goes.
I have to finish this project and get the house rebolted. It's driving me nuts to have my place resting on a stack of railroad ties I bought at Home Depot. Sometimes I walk into a room and do a sudden double-take at the weird intersecting angles of floor vs. ceiling vs. window casing... And I start to thinking that the house has moved again - while I wasn't looking!
Tonight I had cleaned up everything, but then I walked into my office, and it looked so completely catty-wompus that I hurriedly crawled back under the house and pumped the jacks a couple more times, adding lumber... Hoping for the best. What I'm seeing is that all the mouldings were added after the house had settled, so now the floor is level but the mouldings are off - instead of the other way around. It can really fuck with you.
L.A. is sure hot this time of year. It's been awhile since i've felt anything like this. It always makes me want to jump into a dark, cold lake up in canada.
Monday, July 21, 2003
Sunday, July 20, 2003
Last night I had this dream I was in Montreal.
It was snowing - wet and sloppy - and there were people everywhere out in the streets and on the corners.
On what dreamily resembled the corner of Villeneuve and Jeanne Mance there was a little American-style diner that seemed to have a hip scene gravitating to it, and I decided to drop in.
I felt somewhat self-conscious and out of sorts, and I wasn't sure whom exactly I was going to visit up in the old neigbhurhood. I ordered a cheeseburger from the counterman.
"Fallen on hard times have you?" He asked me, as he began to set up the burger on a stainless steel grill.
"No." I replied. "I just like cheeseburgers.
I was trying to remember if anyone I knew still lived at my old apartment at 5969 Park ave. I was having strange visions - as if from previous dreams - of a large additional apartment at the back of that flat, which Mike K. and I had never discovered.
I realized it was Vali I wanted to see, and so I set out again towards the Mile-End. As I stepped out of the greasy spoon, a black Volkswagen squareback passed by in the wet slush - fishtailing left and right.
Outside on the corner, as big wet snowflaes fell, a crowd was gathered as some incident had occurred. A little slow moving old lady was trying to throw rocks at someone else, and everyone laughed at the pair of them cruely and exagerratedly. At first her throws were impotent and off-mark, but then I heard one of the stones striking a body with some power. A few people in the crowd turned to me with gay smiles, and silently mouthed the words "OW"...
The scene changed and I was in a warm, unfurnished house with Hanford Woods. He was pulling on wrist-bands in preparation to go play soccer at the Redpath resevoir. The moment was fleetingly poingnant and precious to me, as it was lifted straight out of childhood's most irretrievable moments. Hanford complimented me on my writing, but I wished he would invite me to play soccer.
And then just as suddenly I was back in California on a beach. There was an enormous aircraft carrier anchored just beyond the surf. Hanford was there, set to begin his soccer game. he explained to me that I had to ride out to the ship in a little remote control dinghy. It wasn't so much a dinghy as an inflatable - but a big, red floppy amorphous raft with a powerful outboard motor.
As I set off towards the massive warship, I was barely clinging to the gunwales of the raft. A woman appeared in the water behind me swimming fast in a breast-stroke. To my disbelief, she overtook the motorized raft to which I was clinging.
It was snowing - wet and sloppy - and there were people everywhere out in the streets and on the corners.
On what dreamily resembled the corner of Villeneuve and Jeanne Mance there was a little American-style diner that seemed to have a hip scene gravitating to it, and I decided to drop in.
I felt somewhat self-conscious and out of sorts, and I wasn't sure whom exactly I was going to visit up in the old neigbhurhood. I ordered a cheeseburger from the counterman.
"Fallen on hard times have you?" He asked me, as he began to set up the burger on a stainless steel grill.
"No." I replied. "I just like cheeseburgers.
I was trying to remember if anyone I knew still lived at my old apartment at 5969 Park ave. I was having strange visions - as if from previous dreams - of a large additional apartment at the back of that flat, which Mike K. and I had never discovered.
I realized it was Vali I wanted to see, and so I set out again towards the Mile-End. As I stepped out of the greasy spoon, a black Volkswagen squareback passed by in the wet slush - fishtailing left and right.
Outside on the corner, as big wet snowflaes fell, a crowd was gathered as some incident had occurred. A little slow moving old lady was trying to throw rocks at someone else, and everyone laughed at the pair of them cruely and exagerratedly. At first her throws were impotent and off-mark, but then I heard one of the stones striking a body with some power. A few people in the crowd turned to me with gay smiles, and silently mouthed the words "OW"...
The scene changed and I was in a warm, unfurnished house with Hanford Woods. He was pulling on wrist-bands in preparation to go play soccer at the Redpath resevoir. The moment was fleetingly poingnant and precious to me, as it was lifted straight out of childhood's most irretrievable moments. Hanford complimented me on my writing, but I wished he would invite me to play soccer.
And then just as suddenly I was back in California on a beach. There was an enormous aircraft carrier anchored just beyond the surf. Hanford was there, set to begin his soccer game. he explained to me that I had to ride out to the ship in a little remote control dinghy. It wasn't so much a dinghy as an inflatable - but a big, red floppy amorphous raft with a powerful outboard motor.
As I set off towards the massive warship, I was barely clinging to the gunwales of the raft. A woman appeared in the water behind me swimming fast in a breast-stroke. To my disbelief, she overtook the motorized raft to which I was clinging.
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