Everything this person has written for TUNETHEPROLETARIAT
Make my sad songs sincere
The Magnetic Fields – No One Will Ever Love You
I’m second choice with the dog even. Third, really. Rawles prefers either roommate over me.
If we’re alone in the apartment, he’s affectionate. He’ll burrow into my chest as I’m watching soccer, or prance around in excitement as I put on my shoes, or sleep in my bed, his chin resting on my stomach. But when someone else is around, the pecking order is clear.
Sometimes, when the humans are sitting on the couch watching Modern Family or something, I’ll call Rawles and pat my thighs. He’ll jump up, walk over my lap and snuggle with the roommate next to me.
For Valentine’s Day I bought myself 69 Love Songs.
The Magnetic Fields – (Crazy For You But) Not That Crazy
Because we live in the Western world and read from left to right, the steak knives on the left endure much heavier use. In the row of six along the bottom of the knife block in the kitchen, the far right one seldom leaves its slot. The two middle ones probably haven’t breathed fresh oxygen since we moved in three-quarters of a year ago.
The mug in the far right corner of the cupboard would probably leave a dust ring. The bottom small fork might have never tasted a human tongue.
Lately I’ve taken to remedying the imbalance. I shuffle the steak knives. I rotate the cups. I extract my silverware from the bottom. Everything deserves to be held on occasion.
I can’t tell if I’m OCD or just lonely.
I’m not the girl you’re taking home
Doing the Harlem Shake alone in your room on Valentine’s Day when the the drier buzzes.
[Body Talk.]
yeyeye
Squat in your sandals and shorts. Spit on the filthy concrete. Wet your finger in the spittle puddle and rub it on the tire valve. Screw the cap back on. Spin the recently replaced tire. Squeeze a tube of oil over the chain. Grease it down with your steady, blackened finger.
[Jiaolong.]
Riviera Rock
Christopher Owens – Riviera Rock
She danced late into the night in a Morocco club, smiling through the light glisten of perspiration on her face, her purple dress billowing around her. Several miles away, an addax loped over a purple bracelet in the desert dunes. Unmarked underneath, her husband’s body decayed.
[Lysandre.]
Lean on old familiar ways
Paul Simon – Still Crazy After All These Years
“I have a headache.”
“Did you take a shower?,” Love asked.
“I tried everything — I took two showers, I took ibuprofen, I drank three glasses of water. I still have it. I’m going to bed,” Mrs. Love said.
It struck me that that was one of the Loves eccentricities. They will raise children who believe taking a shower will cure a headache. That’s just a Thing that will happen.
Every couple has its inexplicable eccentricities. Some put batteries in the fridge. Some put red wine in there. Old wives’ tales persist; I mean, we are still supposed to switch off electronics in a plane, despite Science. [Link 1, 2, 3, 4, infinity.]
Now I’m paranoid that I have a bunch of habits just this side of innocuous that no one has bothered to talk to me about.
Back down, back down
1. I’m 16. I’m on a Vespa, my mom on back. We’re driving to buy bread, zipping down the hilly paved road at about 40 km/h. As we crest one hill, a scooter shoots out from behind a fence. My mother screams into my ear and it startles me more than the motorbike. We hit — hard — and I flip over the top of the handlebars and sail through the air. Time stops. I’m sure, fully positive, that I will die. I know this the same way I know my name. I feel a peace. I’m content. I’m going to die and everything will be ok.
2. I’m 20. I’m in the old gray Nissan truck, a junker with a rusted frame but surprisingly decent engine. All four of us boys learned how to drive stick on it, so the clutch is pretty finicky, but otherwise it has held up well mechanically. My mom is in the passenger seat. We’re driving into town to mail a package at the post office. Over the bridge there’s a three-way light, with a semi waiting at a red. I pull up and he starts drifting backward. I look behind and there’s nobody behind me. I go to put the pickup in reverse, except it keeps jamming. I push the gear stick down and to the right and all I get is that abrasive gear crunching noise. I’m not sure what to do — the semi is rolling slowly toward us — so I just keep trying to jam it into reverse. The semi is feet away. My mom reaches over and pushes the horn frantically, and the truck stops rolling. I probably would have sat there mutely and let him crush me.
3. I’m in fourth grade. Just graduated, in fact. I’m sitting next to my brother in a 20-passanger white van, ready to drive to the airport. All our luggage is piled in the back of a truck. Everyone at my boarding school whose parents live in Indonesia are in the van. Most of them are seniors. The girls are openly weeping, pressing their hands against the windows at their friends and pushing stringy hair out of their wet faces. They don’t know when, if ever, they will see their friends again. Either way, it won’t be the same; they will go to different colleges and grow apart and never raise each other like they did in dorms. We’ve been sitting in the van for half an hour. My brother and I are giddy. We’re on vacation and about to see our parents. And, plus, airplanes! We are laughing and poking each other in the ribs. We are tone deaf. One girl, through heaving sobs, cries, “Can we just go already?” It’s too much to stare at her crying friends, having already said goodbye, just sitting in a cramped sweaty van waiting for life to change, probably for the worse.