My myspace blog only exists in the back of the mind lately, along with a dozen other half lost things.  BUT!  I had to post this one, because I actually know a mermaid!
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There are dozens of other stories born of each great or minor tale we tell.  Stories that travel in directions other than that of their parents.  Like embers from a fire, these asides are often overlooked, but hold within themselves the potential for a beautiful dance of flames, or a horrible conflagration.

When Hook ordered his crew to bombard black tooth cove and take the fight directly to Peter and the lost boys, they also managed to incur the wrath of the mermaids who made their home there.  A mermaid's wrath is a slow, painful thing.  Perhaps, that has something to do with the nature of the creature.

The juvenile mermaid is hardly a threat to anyone.  her teeth and claws are dull and her powers of allure ar like those of teenage virgins: unrealized at their worst, and undirected at their very best.  Her teats are small and her hair too wild and short to distract from her shell shaped ears.  They linger along the shore mostly, as all young sea dwellers know that this is the best place to practice hunting.  The adult mermaid is fairly better off.  her breasts are full and her hair luxurious, and in the water her speed and strength are unmatched.  the elder Sea Hag, on the other hand, looks precisely as frightening as on would imagine, though not because she is ugly.  After about a century or so the sea turns her hair a pale green and her breasts sag, though she still has dark, round nipples which certain men find alluring the way a wet tongue exploring bright red lips can distract the mind from the absence of teeth, or the way the smell of cheap perfume on a lady of the night can cause lust and curiosity to override disgust or self-righteousness.  No, the Sea Hag is terrifying because, for as much as she is obviously inhuman, to a man longing for shore, she is irresistibly beautiful.

The Hag also has a voice, one which defies simple description.  Simply put, it is the kind of voice that can cause as much as five fine, regular men to cast off the thrill of battle to clamor quickly and stupidly into the sea.  "MAN OVERBOARD!" The call came racing along the ship.  By the time the crew had gathered for the rescue three of the men were already eaten.  A fourth man, the salty brigand known as Jonas Blackheart, was seen in the water laughing and weeping simultaneously as the mermaids surrounded him.  Four of them swam with him at the surface.  Their hands caressed his sun-beaten skin.  Their teeth sunk deep into the flesh of his chest, his belly, and his legs.  A single hand grasped passionately at his matted hair.  Later, at his wake, the men would remember that the tho only time Jonas had responded to something with anything more than a miserable grunt was that day.  "Don't save me, gents" he'd manage to say just as he kicked away the buoy and rope meant to save his life, or at least give him hope.  "Oh god.  Oh heaven.  Oh hell what awaits me!  If ye could feel what I'm feeling ye'd beg for the same.  Don't ye dare save me!"

For Jonas the sky, the sea, and everything around him had grown exceptionally bright at that moment.  Several points of light danced before his eyes.  The feel of the mermaids' hands reminded him of a time long ago, when he'd had too much to drink in Tortuga and the bar wench had allowed him to sleep it off by burying his beard in her mountainous bosoms.  It was the only act of affection he'd ever been shown, and in his secret mind Jonas called it love.  The feel of their mouths on his flesh was something immensely better.  The saltwater burned his eyes, the pressure hurt his ears, and each breath of brine was like fire in his lungs.  It was all so exquisite, even as the dancing points of light faded into the stark white glow of death.

I am nothing.  Gossamer.  I am the magical vapors in the wake of the genie.  I am a Techno-Shaman, rattling trackballs in a gourd and shaking my micro-screwdrivers at gremlins and w.o.m.b.a.t.s.

The printer/copier/fax machine out front is fucked.  Its probably about five years old, as old as my 'career' in this place, and its currently experiencing the machine equivalent of multiple organ failure.  The Scanner/copier flatbed is streaked with dirt or grease, and on the underside which i have no idea how to get to.  It stopped scanning in color long ago.  That is, it stopped scanning in proper colors.  Every color scan comes out in shades of blue, and clear white streaks across the page.  The little narrow pane of glass dedicated to the document feeder is spotless, but the document feeder itself needs help in doing its job.  The rubber wheels are all gummy and rotting, and the runners have a tendency to grab several pages at a time, if they manage to grab any.  What's most annoying is what happens when the USB cable is plugged into the machine, or when any activity is prompted by the attached PC.  It'll start to go about its little checks: Warming up scanner bulb.  Checking arm track.  Scanning to PC.   And I'll hear it sort of droning and grinding and flexing those efficient little mechanical muscles.  And then It'll Stop.

Error 79.  Power off then back on.

And it'll do that until I take a hammer to either the printer/copier/fax, or to my own head.

All this, you understand, is beyond my scope.  I can't fix the electrical problem causing the 'Error 79'.  I can't readjust the color sensors so that the scanner doesn't see everything in shades of cyan.  I can't replace the gummy feeder wheels or tighten the treads on the tracks so that it knows how thick a single piece of paper is.  I probably could take the flatbed apart, remove the glass pane and have it cleaned and polished, but I can't guarantee that I'll be able to put it back together again.  I can't fix this thing.  But no one wants to hear that.

"The copier needs servicing"  I say to the woman.  We'll call her the woman for now because you don't really need to know her name or what she does.  All you need to know is that she's the one who is responsible for the printer/copier/fax machine and that I hate her, but I have to be civil to her because...well, because I'm civil to everyone.
"What copier.'  She says and she peers out the window behind me at the machine she's pretending not to have ever known about.
'The (insert model number)."
"Oh, which one is that?'

Its at this point that I'm forced to segment my internal dialogue and what I actually say.  In my head I've already blown up.  In my head I've walked out the room and gone back to something more worthwhile than talking to a halfwitt about a machine that she purchased five years ago.  In my head I'm holding her by the back of the neck and thumping her head against the glass while pointing and saying 'Its the fucking grey one!'  I'm having this reaction now because I've had it before.  Several times.  Once when the streaks on the glass first appeared.  Again when the scanner turned everything blue.  Once as she stood there wondering why the coppier was muching all five pages of her document at once and jammed, and she looked at me and said 'This is a scanner too?'.  But i must be civil.  I must be calm.

"The f...the grey one"  I say.  "Its been a while since its been serviced".  In truth it has never been serviced.  Never cleaned or updated or given the once over.  "And its getting to the point where its malfunctioning more often than its actually functioning."  I know, dear reader, that it is now impossible for me to convince you that what I say is free from any superfluous embelishment.  I've already admitted that i hate the woman, and you must be thinking that this is some frustrated tirade intended to unfairly paint her in a mocking light.  It is, and yet it isn't.  It is a frutrated tirade, I won't deny it, and I do hate the woman.  But This is no embelishment.  I am not painting her in any light other than the harsh flourescence of reality.  The reality is, when i said the words 'malfunctioning' and later 'functioning'; both words consisting of more than two syllables if you hadn't noticed, the woman gave a pause.  I could see in her furrowed brow that she was startled, as if she'd come accross something hard and unpalletable in the lexiconic gruel that she was so used to consuming.  She took a quick breath and looked, for an instant, as if she were about to stand up and inspect the machine herself for signs of this 'malfunkshuning' and I knew that she had forgotten how this conversation had even begun.  Ever civil, I chose to remind her.

"So I think we should call the distributor and have it serviced.'
'Well whenever we call them they usually charge us.'  She said, finally back on the right track.  Sort of.  'And they'll want to take it away and then we won't have any coppier.'
'We'll it'll only be temporary, and in the mean time we can use the other one in the back,"  The 'other one' belonged to man we shall call Mr. Good, because he's generally a good fellow, even when he's not.  He doesn't work with us, except that he works in the same field and we share office space, and he's generally cooperative, well mannered, and good.  Its hard to explain really.  He's apples, we're oranges, but we're all still just fruit.  "Or you can use the little ones here to copy.'  At someone's behest, I'm still not sure who, several people in the office were given little desktop all in ones.  It was rediculous move on several levels, but whats most rediculous is that the people who were 'awarded' with these tiny printers/scanners/copiers procured in the name of efficiency are the type of people who do nothing for themselves. 

They are the hills from which shit rolls down.  They are monkeys ordering their own tails.  They are gopher ranchers.  Gopher this.  Gopher that.  But never gopher it your own damn self.

And so saying 'You can scan and copy from the little printers' is sort of like saying 'You can wipe your own ass for a while, can't you?'  Its not as if I didn't know this already.  It was my very civil way of being a smartass.  The woman, the halfwitt who can't remember that she's responsible for serviceing the equipment which she bought, the equipment that i don't know how to service, knows this too.  She is not as dumb as she pretends to be, and that annoys me even more.  She fixes me with pursed lips, a furrowed brow, and fluttering eyelids which I already know precede a condescending smile, and she says to me.

"Just see what you can do."

What?  Did you not understand what I just said?  I've been 'seeing what I can do' for four years now!  Oh, I'll tell you what I can do!  What I can do is...What I can do...

My inner dialogue is out of gas.  Resigned, I trudge outside, glare at the 'Error 79 message' and pick at the scraggly hairs in my beard.  With no ammount of grace i turn off the printer/copier/fax machine, unplug the USB cable from the computer, and turn the machine back on.  There.  I've done what i can do.  Symptom cured.  I've gotten rid of the cough so it can slowly die of pneumonia.

I'm a fucking quack.

I got an Ipod Nano over the holidays.  It was second hand.  Possibly even third hand.  Its chipped as if someone's been chewing on it, and I'm still not certain whether or not the battery life is what it should be.  I've never had an IPod to compare it to, but then again I have it on for the mojority of the day.  Whether I'm walking to or from work, getting lost, relaxing at home, trying not to get through the work day, or just sitting on the john, I'm safely tucked between my headphones where nothing can get me.  Mostly it helps me focus.  I'm always thinking about music anyway and when I try to focus on actual work (or even play), in my head it sounds like negotiating a conversation in a crowded bar where the music's playing too loud.

Oh, and I missed music so much.  I mean real music, even if that differs from person to person, one thing that I've heard reiterated is that real music is not that stuff they play on the radio.  For me, right now, that's Kanye's 808s and Heartbreak (Kanye puts his foot firmly through the boundaries of Hip-Hop once again, cementing his place in my mind as one of the greatest of this generation), Madlib's Shades of Blue (I'll have to write a completely seperate blog about this one.  I can't sum up everything I love about this six year old album of remixed juxtoposition of jazz and hip hop in a single parenthesesed statement.  There'll have to be a paragraph inspired by the album cover alone!)  , and Cocorosie's The Adventures of Ghosthorse and Stillborn (Possibly the strangest and most wonderful music you've (n)ever heard).  There's more to it than that, including a random assortment of Jazz and Blues dominated by Miles, Coltrain, and Mingus; but as I set my Ipod to shuffle while I write this, these are the albums that really jump out at me.

Its not just the music though.  I've had other mp3 players that haven't held this much appeal to me.  I think there's something to be said about the visual aspect of the new Ipods.  For one thing it's made me appreciate the work that goes into creating a good album cover, summarizing the soul of the album in a static image.  (Except for a few Mix-tapes I've downloaded, they all get it right.) But after a while my brain wants more than just nice noise playing in the background.  Luckily I've discovered some great free podcasts on in the itunes store. (Yes, the same Itunes store that I'm not allowed to buy music from because according to Apple Belize isn't even worth listing as a country.)  The New Yorker: Fiction and The New Yorker: Outloud caught my eye almost immediately.  The stories, or rather the reading of the stories of the former aren't always the best, but they do the job of all great stories: invoke thought (and later conversation, which is a plus.)  The interviews and discussions of the latter are equally enlightening and informative.  When I want more entertainment than conversation fodder I scroll on over to the PRI: Selected Shorts Podcast.  Some time ago, riding high on the success of our Monthly Poetry Nights, Polymath tried doing a short story night.  The concept of the project, which was called Write Out Loud, was somewhat similar to the content of these podcasts (at least in my head), and with Belizean's Old-time tradition of Storytelling I was sure it would have been a hit.  Listening to these podcasts has sort of fanned a few embers from that time.  While I hesitate to call it a failure (We set out to entertain our audience, really. And we did.  All five people that showed up.) at the time the end result stung so bad it affected everything else we had planned.  Now, given some revision, I'm almost willing to try again.

Just a bit more free adertising.  This American Life is my first experience with radio documentaries and I love it.  Simple, conversational, entertaining.  I'd like to try something like that too, someday.  I'm still on the fence about Audiobooks.  All these authors trying to promote their own work with bad recording and silly voices gets a bit tiresome, but some of the stories are genuinely good, and to my mind anything you're willing to put that much work into and then give away for free speaks to a sort of love for the artform that shows up in ones work, making it instantly worthwhile.  Relationships aren't easy and I really get turned off by people who make it seem otherwise.  Scoop and Shanda of Man and Wife don't fall into this category.  The fact that they don't sugar coat or hold back anything makes their relationship advice somehow incredibly plausible.  Plus, they're REALLY fun to watch.

I think that's enough procrastination for right now.  My Ipod and I are gonna get back to work now.

Here I am, struggling through a personal essay for yet another attempt to get out applications before January.  However despite a collection of soothing instrumentals and jazz, and despite there being absolutely nothing to distract me (obnoxious, belching co-workers included) except my own buzzing procrastination, my internal editor, and the ever present internet, it really is a struggle.  I've got a lot on my mind, you see, and its set me on a sort of bitterly angry, frustrated mood.  Everything sounds so tongue-in-cheek, not the kind of impression you'd want to give an acceptance committee, and every revision sounds even more like I'm saying "Y'know what?  Fuck you.", albeit in more eloquent banter.

And then I rememberd Ozzy.

The question was 'When did you become interested in this field (creative writing/English)..." and my immediate answer was, of course, 'Since Childhood, when I would overindulge in an overactive imagination'.  I'd expanded upon that by mentioning that everyone used to sort of laugh and point at the kid who spent his precious break-time talking to lizards and contemplating the daily lives of those who resided in the kingdom of clouds.  I was considered a little bit weird for commanding invisible armies and stupid for trying to feel the heartbeats of trees.  But after we started writing in language arts classes, I'd sort of found my niche.  If anyone thought my stories were weird or stupid then, they didn't say.  The closest ones too me didn't at least.  They just said 'Write more.'

If I were to be completely honest I'd admit that this only applied to those that were in my age group, and with the way Belize's Primary Schools are managed, I knew all 30 kids in my age group personally, since I had to sit in the same class room with them day in and day out.  The younger ones, even those a year younger, wouldn't get it.  And the older ones wouldn't care to.  The long hours my mother used to pull even then meant that I was often left alone with the older ones, and being accepted by my peers didn't mean much when my peers were no longer there.  The big kids didn't just laugh and point and try to make me feel bad.  Some, just for kicks, seemed inclined to beat the imagination out of me, but Osmond Chan wouldn't let them.

It started out strangely.  I was in my own world, being weird and stupid in the schoolyard piloting helicopters over the countryside, seeking out enemy military installments or artillery units to neutralize, when suddenly someone jumped over the school fence and started making du-du-du-du-du noises with his mouth I came under heavy fire from an enemy chopper.  I got scared, but no less weird or stupid I broke off from my original target and took evasive action, but her pursued with his arms tucked in tight at the elbows and fingers pointed missile-pods fully loaded and vulcans hot and ready.  I ran around a bit, almost ran into the wall, turned and went Pshew! Pshew! Pshew!  Then he pretended to crash.  I tried to evade as best I could, and even managed to slip through a narrow ravine where, despite some damage to my rotors, I was able to empty my remaining payload and burried him in the rubble.

Here was someone who could engage with me the way no one else had so far.  Who didn't just play with me, but played along, adhering to the rules and laws that we made together.  We made it a regular thing after school, slaying dragons and fending off alien invasions.  Mind you, many a time our adventures would descend to 'Lets wash these magic dishes', but I let him have those every so often.  It was the least I could do for all the times he'd protected me from meanspirited older kids eager to rob a ten year old of his snack money, and even for saving me from a group of kids who thought I should have my first hit of weed by force.  Most importantly though, he accepted me. and told me that there was no reason I should feel ashamed for having a bright imagination.  I owe Ozzy, as he had me call him, endless thanks and appreciation.

I'd been in New York for about two and half years, and returned in 1996.  Sometime during that time Ozzy died in a traffic accident.  Though I may remember him occasionally, I'll never forget him completely.

I'm developing a certain love for the game of football.  It's something that only comes with the experience of it.  A level of appreciation I could only come across by playing.  It would be lost to me simply watching on TV, and has been thus far.  It's more than the obvious appeal that comes with physical exertion, and believe me there's plenty of exertion.  I've discovered my body is just too big for a game like this.  The ball goes one way and I charge with the same sort of steadfast lumbering that makes me effective in more physical sports.  Then, in an instant the ball has gone another direction and whether I choose to follow or back pedal the result is the same: an aching in my legs from my hips to my ankles.  My body shouts "No more sudden changes in directions!"  That aching is also pleasurable in a way.  It meets up with the sweat from my body and the burning in my lungs, and they grasp each other as long lost brothers to say "We have done something here!"

 
And then there is the beauty and grace that even an oaf such as me is capable of.  At certain key points where I actually seem like I know what I'm doing, I go into a strange trance.  My mind takes a step back and from there I can admire it all.  The other players arrange themselves strategically, ready to attack or defend, or they stand like great pillars of power, each confident in itself yet acknowledging a reliance on the other player.  They aren't the superstars soaring above the others in a grandiose display of contempt.  It isn't rugby or gridiron in which the majority of the team sacrifices itself so that one or two individuals can shine.  There's a primordial sort of magic that's at work every time the ball comes skidding across the dewy grass, whispering to itself until it meets dominance at the end of my foot.  I look about me and there are faces talking to me.  They are hunters and warriors saying 'You are strong." and "I am quick." and 'WE are powerful."  There's poetry in there somewhere.  Perhaps one day I'll be able to pry it out and put it on paper.  So far there's really nothing like playing.

 
My only concern since I've begun playing has been the kids.  On one evening in particular we were besieged by a cadre of nine and ten year olds, all begging and whining to play until we finally allowed them in, with a clear warning not to get crushed, as if we could not be held responsible for being the ones doing the crushing.  I wish I could honestly say that they were NOT crushed.  Several times my lumbering came to an abrupt end when one of the urchins bounced defiantly off of me, or became tangled in my legs.  But they took these scrapes as part of the game, and the other parts were theirs.  They soared and bounced and dashed, intercepting almost every ball that was passed.  They made up for their small strides and tiny arms with an amazing athleticism and flexibility even for their ages.  And they did it all barefoot and in rags.  It occurred to me they could be great; greater than they already were, of course.  It occurred to me that if they had the right kind of encouragement and guidance, that if their parents bought them balls and shoes instead of videogames and toy guns, then these kids could make a beautiful life out of this beautiful game.  That glimmer of hope, I think, makes me love this game.