I'm thinking of L.O. again-- the Gemini-- because Scooter, Jay and I went there a few times-- and Scooter came with the map of Southwest-- Barbur, Luradel, where he used to live with Carl--

My tenth high school reunion rented the Gemini. I resented it first of all, once the nostalgia was rinsed away by the sight of all these people that really could have cared less-- then-- and why would they now? Except for one reason: the most I could hope for at school was a role as some kind of character... Someone whose unfitness became the central fact of their being... And perhaps my subsequent failures were seen as an inevitable outcome of this bad character design... An affirmation of a certain upper-middle-class Calvinism-- designed to show the utter necessity of conformity-- I imagine ninety-nine percent of any reference to me by those who knew me slightly consisted of observations along these lines... And it's a measure of the fragility of my state of mind, how much I agree with these shadowy judges...

But once I overcame the first rush of apprehension and hostility-- a physiological reaction I have at all parties and social functions-- I realized there were faces I'd never known and wished I had-- and now, in an important sense, it was too late. And now when I feel sorry about that I feel sorry for myself.

All of these pointed thoughts rise to the surface again, all of these knives in the water... I remember a constant wishing, if not striving, in those school days, for a belonging, a good standing that could never be mine... Illuminated by periods of wonder and peace that came only with a resignation to who I was as opposed to who I wished I was... But now, all the things that endure are those most fragile: light under clouds... A flash in a water droplet:

The warm, sweet smell of the Iron Mountain trail in Tryon Creek-- the carpet of gauzy cottonwood seeds

The musty smell of the lake in the swim park

The orange light on the blackberry canes by Country Club

The smell of burgers, exhaust, the waft of perfume on the walk to the Tillamook Creamery on B Street

The baking vinyl in my mother's 1969 VW Squareback

The maple seeds furry with splinters, covering the front walk

The broad blue squares of sky between the steel posts of the breezeway behind the parking lot at the high school-- a glorious vault that had no limit, a warehouse plenty big enough for my modest romances--

All of these things remain, but only as pointers. The place and the map have both changed. The signs do not signify the same things anymore-- even the big landmarks, the ones that seemed so permanent, so solid, are gone-- Gone so completely that it takes a mighty act of will to sketch in even their broad outlines...

Meantime, the sky has cooled, become alien. If I didn't belong there now, boy I sure don't now.

Am I summing up like this because it's Christmas and no one seems to give a fuck? Perhaps, perhaps. Is it death? Also a person of interest, this death, especially now, as every year this time. He knocks over all the signs, burns all the thickets, plows up all the old footprints.

And now I must make sense of this new terrain-- The problem being that I never really did have the exploring bug... The problem being that I really just do not want to know now that everything's been flattened.