Fan’s Complaint

It occurred to me that I’ve spent my entire life, except for my four years in Minnesota, on islands. I was born in Hong Kong, and then came here at the age of eight, and I’ve pretty much been here, either on the island of Manhattan or on Long Island, ever since.

That’s why I’m afraid of crossing bridges. I remember the first time I went to Stillwater, and I saw that bridge over the St. Croix, I was afraid to cross it. It isn’t as though I thought a troll would pop up (though I was a bit scared that I would have to pay a toll, even though there wasn’t a toll booth in sight), I’m just uncomfortable with crossing bridges without being entirely certain what is on the other side.

I remember one time on the FDR, I was impatient with a slow-driving granny in front of me, so I kept revving my engine really high to scare her (this was with my beloved black s12, which had an aftermarket exhaust). The loudness of the engine reverberating off the walls of the tunnel was intoxicating, so much so that I missed my exit. I took the very next one, which led to an bridge into the unknown, which turned out to be the Bronx, where dogs were running wild, garbage cans were ablaze, people drove on the wrong side of the street, and the natives played a game involving a goat’s severed head.

***

I had big plans for this little essay, on the literal and metaphorical acts of crossing bridges and burning bridges and such, but I’m too lazy to work at it. Let’s just all go watch Dr. Phil and call it a day.

***

In sophomore year, I played a lot of Tony Hawk. To get the secret tape for the downhill level, one had to make a big jump over a chasm. You knew that glowing reward was somewhere on the other side of the gap, but there was no real way to aim your jump ensure a safe landing. It was, in essence, “a leap of faith.”

I equated that in-game action to a step that I was considering in real life, and I formed a ritual of yelling those three words (”LEAP OF FAITH!”) each time I attempted getting that secret tape. I’m not sure if it was a form of prayer or merely a way of instilling confidence, but I believed that success at my virtual Leap of Faith would translate into real life. I even drew a picture, using cray-pas, of my character (Jamie Thomas, who wore a hoodie in the game, as I did throughout college) jumping that gap, except he was reaching for a glowing heart instead of a tape.

My belief in the supernatural powers of repeating this task further increased when I started playing Tony Hawk 2 and found that it rewarded extra points and displayed, in bold blue text, “LEAP OF FAITH!” for making a similar jump. It had to be a sign that my three magic words had made their way into the game–I was on the right track, and I too could take that leap and land happily on the glowing heart.

Of course, I wouldn’t be here writing this today if that was how it happened. If I had been able to win that heart, I would be rolling around with puppies in a sunny meadow. I took a leap of faith and did a faceplant into the rocks below.

***

That was over four years ago now. I’ve recovered from that fall, and several others since. Though I often wonder how many more of those falls I have left in me, and whether I’ll soon be too broken down to make another attempt, sometimes (including right now), I regret more the leaps that I never took, as I gird myself for the next.

[Isn’t obvious symbolism wonderful?]

Genius that I am, I decided to take a walk around my neighborhood at 4am during the blizzard to take pictures. The pictures came out pretty poor, but I was heartened to see that the clerks at the store that we called “the Horny Hindus” when we were kids were hard at work.

Whenever it is I wake up today, I will have to shovel. If there are no more entries after this one, it is because I died of a heart attack. I was pretty out of breath by the time I finally came back inside, even though I walked no more than ten blocks (although I did have a healthy glow about my cheeks when I looked in the mirror).

For a moment, during my walk back, right after I misjudged the solidity of a snowdrift, I was happy about the snow. Maybe it had something to do with reading this article, and the metafilter thread from which it was linked. “Look at me! I’m freezing my ass off in the middle of the night in the middle of a blizzard and I’m having fun! I’m not grown up and I’m proud of it!” And then I started to lose my breath and really needed a cigarette and wished I were indoors enjoying a beer and a nice cream soup.

And here are the damned pictures.

Unfortunately, this is the only photo I took tonight that came out. In
addition to the untterly uninteresting drive-thru lane of the white
castle, I also went to a party and a club tonight.

It occurred to me just how old I was when all I could talk about at the
party was how nice the apartment was. A girl even came up to me at one
point and introduced herself. She said something to me in mandarin,
which I don’t speak, which prompted an explantion of where I was from,
and why I don’t speak mandarin, which led to her saying that her
mandarin wasn’t all that good, which led to an awkward silence. This is
why I shouldn’t drive to parties. Not that I’m less awkward when drunk,
but I think I’d be more entertaining.

It now occurs to me that there is no reason to blog from this device
when I’m already home.

At the club, while people were practically having sex on the dance
floor, I stood in one spot from which I watched as the coat check girl,
horse-faced though she was, and dramatically lit behind a series of
windows, periodically seemed to succumb to loneliness and despair. I
wanted to take a picture of her, but this hiptop’s camera is worthless
in the dark. She was probably just bored and not at all lonely or
despairing.

Later, outside the club, an attractive blonde in a very short red skirt
repeatedly bent over in search of either her dog or her small green army
bag. She was carrying half a bottle of grey goose. As she, along with
her dog, left with two men in a camry, the bouncer said, “That’s some
circus sex they’re gonna have tonight.”

This entry would have been a lot better if my camera functioned in the
dark.

I got my Sidekick today, and though there are some difficulties (aren’t there always?), this does work well enough for me to be thumbing text in bed. I could also shoot a photo of the view here, but my ceiling is pretty boring.

Now, if I were still working in the city, I might actually have something of interest to write about on this little device, perhaps a bald man with a hole in his pocket who’s running his hand through his hair (thanks, Lauren). But being in Jersey, the best I would come up with would probably be a really bad car accident (the one this morning that cost me an hour involved an SUV, a compact car facing the median, and a third car which was already on a flatbed by the time I got there. There were also four police cars and two ambulances.

Who are these people who get into accidents when road conditions are good anyway? Probably assholes who have fancy cellphones trying to surf the web and drive at the same time…

Yesterday, there were two accidents, on account of the snow, and it took me three and a half hours to go 50 miles. If that was the rate at which I had to drive all the time, I would probably still be in California right now. Wait, that doesn’t sound so bad.

I lied, here is a view from my bed anyway.

I got some free money today, and purchased a new gadget. More to come.

Today was my last day of work for a while (maybe until next week, maybe for longer than that). I went to my usual smoking spot, right next to the “No Smoking” sign, to have my post-work smoke. I thought that maybe I should do something special, to commemorate the occasion. After all, I’ll probably be back in Jersey the next time I have work.

So I take out my camera, and I tried to get into a good James Dean pose, but it’s hard to do that while you have a man-purse, and using one arm to try to take a picture of yourself.

That is why there is no picture of the man-purse tonight. Maybe the next time I find myself next to a no smoking sign, in good light, when I have a friend with me who can take a picture, everyone can enjoy the hilarious sight of my man purse.

I could of course take a picture of it now, sitting on my bed, flap hanging open for easy access to my books, but the pack of trojans that I bought for dubious reasons prior to driving through Vegas is clearly visible. Some other time.

sigh

I’m at a Carnival, minding my business, when all of a sudden I am completely certain that I need to flee. I run past some people to get on a ferris wheel. This must be a fairly large ferris wheel, because the cars are enclosed. The car that I dash into happens to have Bill Murray as a passenger. Surprised, I tell him that I really enjoyed his last movie. He thanks me and tells me that he heard Lucy Liu really enjoyed my last book.

“I wrote a book?” I ask.

“Yeah, it just came out,” he tells me.

I think I ask him what my book was about, and he says that he didn’t read it, but assumes it had a lot of Asian American Issues in it, which must be why Lucy Liu liked it so much. From the ferris wheel, I spot Lucy Liu walking in the crowd, eating cotton candy and holding a book.

And then I woke up.