45. where you go, you take yourself
Neil Jung twanged on the car radio. Denver and Icky were well on
their way through the central valley. They had stopped off in Modesto
for a joint and were finishing the last of their coffee in the
parking lot of a shopping mall with detached twenty-four hour fast
food drive-through restaurant.
“Find something else?” Denver suggested and took a toke.
“Don’t you like folk music?” Icky reached over and fidgeted with the
dial.
“Yeah. I do. I’d just rather hear the hypnotic voices of mysterious
bulgarian folk singers than the dreary strums of american country
western. It’s not like we’re going to get anything like that on the
radio ’cause this car is from Detroit, we are in the United States
and we are Californians. It’s only AM or FM from the Pacific to the
Atlantic, K in the west and W in the east.” He cracked the window and
discarded the cowboy.
“ … of letting up. Flooding has occurred in …”
“Wow. It’s already flooding. Leave it on for a second.”
“… I chi, you be. So to, you do,” spoke a female voice on the radio.
A bell rang and the voice spoke another phrase, which neither could
understand.
Icky reached over to change the station.
“Wait a minute,” Denver said, holding out his hand to stop Icky.
“Do you want to hear this?”
“It’s better than american folk music. It’s something different.”
“What’s she saying?”
“I don’t know,” Denver said and they both sat silent and motionless
listening to the mantra, trying to make out the words.
Icky spoke first. “You know what it sounds like to me?”
“I think I do.” They started to mouth the words along with the voice
on the radio until they were both rocking with the rhythm and
vocalizing the mantra.
“You go girl. You go girl. You go girl. You go girl.”
They looked at each other momentarily wrinkling their eyebrows and
shaking their heads questioning what they were saying. “You go girl?”
still rocking until the voice suddenly stopped.
“You mother fuckers are replicas of things that should of been dead
long ago.”
Icky and Denver were hooked. The only other sound was the raindrops
beating down on the Galaxy.
“Peace and love and happiness. What do you want to hear?” the voice
asked then took a deep breath.
“Excuse me. Squeeze me. Bless you, Sisters. I want to ask you some
questions.” She enunciated her words and paused between
each phrase.
“Is your house in order? If not, it is time to clean it up. Remember,
cleanliness is where the goddess is at. Put some order in your house
and get it ready for the guests, Sisters. It’s time to make a happy
house.” A banal rhythm of easy listening played briefly.
“Is she recommending household cleaning tips, or what?” Icky asked
pathetically.
“Are you healthy?” continued the soothing female voice. “Have you
made your body a temple for the spirit? It is time to perfect your
body. Are you happy? Is your happiness derived from love and through
learning? Have you achieved happiness in knowledge or in your
achievements? Are you satisfied? Do you want more? Have a nice day,
Sisters. Though I know it is what they all say.”
“Geez, man. She sure asks a lot of questions,” Icky stated and turned
up the volume. “It must be a new and powerful feminist self help
group broadcasting from a community collage. Maybe it’s a radio play.”
“Goddess Bless you Sisters,” the voice continued. “Ring my bell.”
A bell rang and another smooth, calm female voice began to sing
slowly in the background,
Workin’ in the coal mine
goin’ down, down.
Workin’ in the coal mine.
Oooh, I gotta get down.
6 o’clock in the mornin’,
I’m already up and gone.
Oh! I am so tired
feels like I can’t go on.
’Cause, I’m workin in the coal mine,
goin’ down, down, down.
There was a moment’s pause before the main voice spoke again. “I am
not satisfied. I am so tired of waiting. I would love for something
to happen. An evolutionary step in the right direction instead of a
de-evolutionary step in the wrong one. It is an unfinished journey
that we are in the midst of and we need to pack up and continue the
march towards social reform.
“Sisters. I want to talk about the love and r-e-s-p-e-c-t that each
and everyone deserves. Because when you do not have the love
and the r-e-s-p-e-c-t from your Sisters, it is P.M.S.”
“What that mean?” Icky hurriedly asked.
“Geez Icky. Don’t be stupid. Premenstrual Syndrome.”
“Sisters, I am so tired. Every time I turn on the radio, the
television, search the net or open the newspaper I am so tired of
hearing, seeing, experiencing and reading about men fighting for some
dogma or another. It is heavy P.M.S. Pretty Much the Same. Alleluia.”
Other female voices in the background confirmed her statement.
“That’s clever.”
“Yeah. I’m remembering that one,” Denver interjected. “This must be …”
Icky quieted Denver with a sharp „Sshss!”
“Every day is a sad day. Without love and respect, one feels like a
worthless amoeba in the cold, damp, ultra black coal mines deep
inside mother earth, alone in squalor, tortured by loneliness. Every
human is a source of information. We need to communicate, babble,
exchange ideas, learn and educate each other. But without this
respect, every drip of a stalactite is a foreign language that we but
little understand. Every day is hell even in spring. Singing the
blues comes naturally.”
Again a bell rang and the female voice sang:
I was untrue.
What have I put you through?
I wanted someone new,
but you knew
and now you too
are gone and I am blue.
What am I going to do?
I still love you.
Boo hoo.
“Everything rhymes with blue.” She continued her discourse. “Every
soap opera and county-western song makes sense. Get down.”
She raised her voice.
“Yes! Without a little L & R, it is like a day without sunshine, a
sad day, separated, divorced from every, every, everything around us.
It is hell. Boredom would be a comfort but all there remains, is
absolute stagnation and nothingness. Revenge? For what?
Suffering and suicide are not alternatives. No sex whatsoever.”
“I feel she is talking directly to me.” Denver confirmed.
“Don’t worry Sisters, we are in love and we are in house. Alleluia.”
“I can’t believe it!” exclaimed Denver. “In the middle of dumb-fuck
no where. I think it’s Gogo Sunshine. She’s the one who does that
lightbulb thing.”
“Sister!” a third voice, deep with intention, pronounced. “Hit me
with your rhythm stick.” The bell rang and she sang:
A-B-C.
Easy as one, two, three.
A. B. C.
You and me, baby.
A-B-C-1-2-3-A-B-C.
You and me girl.
Denver and Icky sang along until the music came to an abrupt stop and
the main voice returned to the microphone speaking still distinctly
yet more quickly, “I am tired of the lies. I want to be free of
manipulation by the white supremacist. Free to fly away like the
butterflies do at the zoo.”
The bell rang and the original vinyl recording of the Norma Child
song, with skips, played for a moment:
Want to be a butterfly
flying free at the zoo.
I want to fly, fly away
and get away, ’way from you.
I want to be a butterfly
flying free at the zoo.
I want to fly in the sky
and get away, ’way from …
“Fuck the pope,” the voice said as the song faded out. “Fuck the
ayatollah khomeini. Fuck the rabbi heller. Fuck the holy brahmin.
Fuck institutionalized religion! Fuck the U.S.A., W.T.O., G.A.T.T.,
N.A.F.T.A. and N.A.T.O. Fuck C.B.S., N.B.C, A.B.C., C.N.N., B.B.C.
and M.T.V. Fuck I.T.T., I.B.M., A.T.T., M.C.I. and G.T.E. And fuck
PDF, JPG, DOC, and WRD. And fuck militant non-smokers.
They are so silly.”
“That’s right, woman,” Icky affirmed, “they are.”
“If man makes religion and religion creates war, then man is war.”
“Aha,” a group of women’s voices agreed in the background.
“If man makes politics and politics declares war, then man is war.”
“Aha.”
“If man makes the media and the media report the war, then man is war.”
“Wow!” Icky uttered. “This is almost too much for me.” He was quickly
silenced by Denver.
“It takes five seconds to decide. Five seconds of your time to
decide, if you are part of the problem or if you are part of the
solution.” She started counting off, “One, two, three, four, five.”
“I’ve decided,” Denver announced.
“I’m with ya’,” Icky joined in.
“Vote for me, I will set you free. I am the new age.” She repeated
the sentences and the congregation could be heard expressing its
support in the background. All of a sudden, she stopped everyone
short by interjecting, “Heil Peace!”
“Heil Peace!” Denver and Icky repeated raising their left arms high,
and looked at each other.
“Hey. That comes from the Art Angles.”
“Must be C.C.” Denver said. “Common consciousness.”
There was a long pause and they heard the studio audience squirming
in their seats.
“I forgot what I was going to say. S.T.M.L. Short Term Memory Loss.
It happens when I get stoned.” She paused again.
Icky said, astonished, “Can you believe what you just heard? She
admitted to getting high. This is brilliant! This must be a pirate
radio station, or maybe the aliens are beaming down their message.”
“It’s Gogo Sunshine. I know her website.” He looked at Icky. “You
know, I told you already.”
“Mother mercy! What have I done? Oh yeah. Sisters, I was going to
tell you a story: One foggy evening, I met an alien disguised as a
mild-mannered, middle-aged, suburban garden troll. As I approached
the extra terrestrial, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a
yellow piece of paper. He said that he had been watching me and gave
me a piece of paper that has changed my life. On this piece of paper
was written the code: E. G. Y. P. T.”
Icky slammed his left foot down on the brake pedal and jerked back
into his seat. “Woah, man!” His lower jaw dropped and he put his hand
to his heart, speechless. The similarities of circumstances were
becoming more than simply coincidental. Denver was hyperventilating
and looked at Icky for reassurance.
“I now possess the code to talk to the aliens and I have been talking
to them.” Her voice changed, “Hello. Hello. The aliens are talking to
me. They are communicating with me. They are saying things to me.”
“L.S.M.F.T. I wonder if she’s got a cigarette package up to her ear.”
Denver murmured, “Hello. Hello,” while looking out the Galaxy’s window.
“Sisters! I have come here today to give you that code. But first, I
am going to tell you what the aliens have been telling me. The aliens
don’t come too often but when they do! Sisters! The energy was out
there not too long ago. I felt it and I prayed to the Goddess. I lit
my candle and rang my bell. And they started talking. They started
telling me things, not in code. Not in tongues, but in plain speak so
that I fully understood and you know what they said?” she took a long
pause as any good storyteller would to keep the suspense peaked at
just the right level.
Icky and Denver held their breath.
“They said,” she whispered, and the bass gonged on the cheap
cardboard speakers and the tone vibrated inside the Galaxy.
“They have been saying that this society in which we are living is
dedicated to the white, christian, heterosexual man otherwise known
as the white supremacist, whose number is 666. It is he who is
constantly striving to progress, to go longer, taller, thicker,
deeper, wider, higher and larger, to go fast, faster, the fastest, to
grow big, bigger, to be the biggest, to be the better man, a better
man than him, the very best of them all.”
“His striving is based on the terrible masculine monotheism founded
for the salvation of his ego, built with no concern for nature and
with total disrespect for everyone who is not heterosexual and male!
Alleluia Sisters! I’m not finished reading!”
“Alleluia Sister. Read woman. Read!” Denver managed to
exclaim though concentrating deeply on every word she spoke.
“Fellow lesbians.”
“I didn’t know I was a lesbian.” Icky said.
„You are now.”
“We are suppressed, exploited by chauvinistic macho pigs, giant pink
sea slugs, slimy yuppie surfer boys and moose heads of mega-
corporations. Sisters, I know plenty of these dogs that go about
their day, everyday, lifting up their leg and leaving their mark on
every corner.”
“They wake up, drink coffee, eat breakfast, defecate, take a shower,
shave and brush their teeth.” She returned to the calm cadence with
which she had begun. “Everyday, they drive a car, go to work, eat
lunch, eat dinner, watch TV and make whoopee. Everyday they drink a
beer, or smoke a cigar, or pop a pill and stare at the empty white
walls.”
“Born in the town, they will live in the town, they will die in the
town, they were born in the town, they will live in the town, they
will die in the town, they were born in …” The phrase was picked up
by the background singers as she continued to read.
“In the meantime, they eat, and eat, and eat, and when their bellies
are full and are almost ready to burst, these anal retentive assholes
can not even shit straight. In fact, they can’t even shit at all.
They are all constipated. They are all i.r.r.e.g.u.l.a.r. Irregular.
They all need a good enema. And Sisters, the time has come to
administer, to insert and to flood the guts of mankind. The time has
come for the anal revolution. It’s time to get the shit rolling
because life is not a buffet, and you cannot eat all you want.
Alleluia.”
“Alleluia!” Denver shouted. “Hooked on enemas. Sister, get down!”
“I want to ask you something. I want to ask you something personal. I
know I am not going too far because we are all Sisters here. We are
all family here. Is that right?”
A chorus of voices hummed their approval.
“How do you wipe your rosette? Think about it!”
“Miss Thing. You are wicked for asking,” remarked Denver.
“She never stops asking questions.”
“What kind of toilet paper do you use? Is it that soft-cushy-quilted
little number that comes in all sorts of rainbow colors? Or is it
that extra-extra two or four ply tissue that smells like grandma’s
ten-year-old bottle of MeMe? How many sheets of toilet papers do you
use per action? Do you fold it, wad it or crumple it all up in your
hand? Do you wipe your rosette more than once and how do you
wipe it?
Front to back or back to front? Are you used to the smell?”
Icky snorted, wiped the buggers and said, “The smell of my own shit.
Geez Enver, I never really thought about that.”
“Do you like the smell of your own farts?”
“Miss Gogo, don’t stop!” Denver interjected.
“Have you ever stopped to think what you would do without toilet
paper? Or that humans are the only animals that even take the time to
wipe their butts, let alone produce the paper with which to do it?”
“Oh child. Woman here is speakin’ the truth,” Denver testified while
raising and shaking the palms of his hands to the heavens. “What a
great way to save the planet.”
“Sisters. Sisters. Do you look at your poop when you are done? And
finally, my last question.”
“I thought she’d never stop.”
“Are you satisfied? Sisters, we are what we eat and the proof is in
the pudding! Alleluia!”
Once again, the group of female voices sounded their approval.
“Get down!” Denver exclaimed and bowed his head. The
moment seemed
right for a spiritual experience and Denver was taking advantage.
“Sisters. We have come together to rejoice in who we are, to
celebrate our identity as lesbians. The Goddess blesses all the
lesbians here today. We have come together as proof of who we are and
what we must do in order to be respected, not just accepted. I just
want to live. I want to feel the music. I was born to be alive.” The
bell rang and she sang:
Born. Born. Born.
Born to be alive.
Yes. I was born, born, born.
Born, to be alive.
“To experience and to learn, to rejoice in our ability to reason, to
think, to speak and therefore to exist. Our identity is not defined
from the outside but from within ourselves. It is a culture and it is
ours.”
“What’s she goin’ on about this lesbian shit for? I don’t know if I
can identify with that word, Denver.”
“I’ll explain later.” He waved his hand to silence his traveling
companion. “Let me listen.”
“We are not lesbian slaves. Sisters, I am every woman and I am coming
up. We are the niggers of the world and it is time for each of us to
state, once and for all: I am a lesbian and I like it. I like it a lot.”
“She sure goes on ‘bout this lesbian cause.” Icky said feeling
annoyed. “Where is she comin’ from?”
“We have got to fight for our right to make love, to save sex. Save
sex, safe sex.”
“It’s time to save sex,” a male voice intervened.
“Where’d he come from?”
Denver shrugged his shoulders. “Maybe it was the voice of the sponsor.”
“Hey, what time is it?” the female voice returned.
“Time?” they both chirped in unison.
“It’s time for our science lesson.”
“What’s this woman got on her mind?”
“Magi Head, famous anthropologist, now deceased, noted that the
eskimos have more than two dozen words for describing snow, showing
its importance in their society. I want to illustrate this point by
noting many of the supplementary words used for describing ’penis’
and ’vagina’ in this society. Let’s start with the penis first, shall
we? Please repeat after me:
„Penis, cucumber, bone, boner, cock, dick, erection, hose, manroot,
joystick, banana, knob, love muscle, member, nuts, organ, pick,
zucchini, Q-tip, rod, staff, totem pole, weenie, dingle, hammer,
jewels, meat, prick, quick stick, ramrod, pole, stick, tool, willy,
business, devil stick, hot dog, peter, stinger, tube, pee pee, wee
wee, dong, phallus, ding dong, pleasure pole, wang and finally, love
rooster.”
The congregation solemnly repeated each word after her, as did Denver
and Icky, laughing at the endless euphemisms being broadcast on the
radio.
“Now, onto the vagina. Once again, please repeat. Box, dial, cunt,
kitty.”
“Crystal. Oh fuckin’ A, man. I forgot that I had a date tonight.”
“Lovelips, mound, pussy, snatch, twat.”
“With who?”
“Bell, cat, labia, peach.”
“Crystal. You know. Miss Rivercondo.”
“Slit, pineapple, pudenda, beaver, muff, gash, hole …”
“Whatcha goin’ to do?” Denver managed to ask between
peals of laughter.
“Pud, clit, and finally, cherry.”
“Nothin’. I forgot. Your tragedy took priority.”
“That concludes our science lesson for today. Your homework will be
to write a one-page essay using as many of the words that you learned
as possible. Remember to use your imagination. Extra points will be
given for the most creative story.”
“She’s got a point,” Denver added.
“Fellow lesbians! Sisters! I want to tell you something that you
probably haven’t realized. We are a gift. Yes! We are a gift from the
Goddess to the mother, to Mother Earth, naturally, you and I. Yes
lesbians, because we do not participate in the lie of the patriarch,
the lie of breeding, the lie of belonging to someone.”
“Read woman. I think that myself,” Denver responded.
“It is understandable that I do not have, have to, want to, or will
slip a child into this world. I want my world for me and for everyone
in the world today, the five fundamental human rights, the five
fundamental wheels of existence: the right to clean air, food and
water, the right to shelter, the right to learn, the right to
meaningful activity and the right to love, with whom I want, when I
want and where I want. We must achieve these fundamental rights and
these rights must be guaranteed to all.”
“However, the patriarchal powers in this society go to all costs to
protect their god given, and this time I say, god-damned right to
breed. They murder us with wars and state executions and lock us up
in prisons and ghettos. The dogmas of their religions mold the
society to patriarchal standards, which impose strict moral codes in
order to suppress people’s instincts.”
“Genius. You go girl, this is fabulous stuff!” Denver testified.
“Lesbians. I will not shoot my wad for their holy future or prepare
my bed for their seed. For many, there is no thing, no, nothing more
important than immortality, which means breeding and creating a
future, playing god. And I am sorry, I do not play god that way.”
“Me neither, sister,” Denver said and slapped the dashboard with his
left palm.
“Children, children, children. I have nothing against children. But,
I want utopia! I want utopia now, not in some future generation. It
is wishful thinking and it is pathetic.”
“Well. All right!” Denver whooped.
“Lesbians! We are a gift, you and I. We are a gift to the Mother from
the Goddess, in order to control the population! Yes, Sisters.
Everyone is talking about over-population but few are doing anything
about it. Everyone is talking about the rape of Mother Earth. But
still an animal or plant species dies out, ceases to exist every 15
minutes. The chain is broken. Mother, what have I done?” She had now
worked herself to a fever pitch.
“Sisters, Mother Earth has Aids. She has been weakened by man’s
constant efforts to control her. Her immune system is weak. Her body
is beginning to break down, attacked by the very creatures she
supports. She cannot fight against the disease called ’mankind’.
“And what he is doing, he calls free enterprise. Free enterprise is
nothing but a carte blanche to go into another country and get what he
wants, to exploit cheap labor, to hinder social advances, to install
his friends at the top, to rob countries of their resources and to
take the entire profit back to his own country. That’s what he calls
free enterprise! I call it rape. Like a dog returning to eat its own vomit,
I see HIM again!” She shouted and all were silent.
“Lesbians unite! We are not going to clean up their shit anymore.
It’s time to take control of our lives, to be pro-life, to take
control of our bodies, to be pro-choice. Let us unite and take over,
be pro-over.
“I’m going to set you on fire.”
The sound of a blazing bonfire and the slow rhythmic beating of drums
in the background could be heard. A bell rang and a women’s choir
softly sang:
Going down, down, down,
in the ring of fire. The ring of fire.
Going burn, burn, burn,
in the ring of fire. The ring of fire.
“The fire is burning. Yellow Sisters, because yellow is the color of
the millennium. Yellow is brilliant. Yellow is light. Yellow is sun.
Yellow is life and I live, therefore I am. Yellow is the concept.
Forget pink. Think yellow. Burn. Baby burn. You are all on fire!”
Denver pointed to himself and said, “I am with ya’.”
The choir continued singing softly in the background.
“The time has come to entrust this congregation with the code to talk
to the aliens.” She returned to a narrative cadence. “Take out your
paper and pen and get ready.”
A short scramble ensued as Icky and Denver searched the front seat
for a piece of paper and a pen.
“Egypt!” she said, “Egypt is the code to talk to the aliens.”
Unable to find the items required in time, Denver wrote the code on
the now fogged up windows of the Galaxy.
“Wait. I already have the code.” Icky searched his pockets for his
yellow piece of paper.
“E. G. Y. P. T. is an acronym. The E is for Egypt, G is for gives, Y
is for you, P is for plenty and T for time. What does that spell?”
The voices in the background rang out, “Egypt gives you plenty time.”
“Right.” Her voice assumed a pleasant authoritarian quality, “Now,
take the last letters of this phrase, the T at the end of Egypt, the
S at the end of gives, the U at the end of you, the Y at the end of
the plenty and the E at the end of time. What’s that spell?”
The congregation spelt the letters of the code, “T. S. U. Y. E.”
“Right,” she affirmed. “This is an acronym for …”
“… to see under your eye.” The audience completed the message.
“Wow. So that’s what it means,” Icky said softly, “Yeah. Now I
remember. That’s what the guy said.”
“That’s right, Sisters. The third eye. The one between your eyes. Your
instinct, your intuition, your spirituality. Goddess bless.”
“Goddess bless!” the congregation affirmed.
“Here kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty. Here kitty, kitty, kitty,” she
repeated for quite some time. “Here kitty, kitty, kitty.” A cat’s
purr was heard in the background.
“Fellow lesbians, you are in a circle. You have what it takes. You
possess the code to communicate with the aliens. You have received
the code. Use this code to change the world, your world, to change
yourself, to plant your garden and to pee on it. Make it grow.”
“Here kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty. Here kitty, kitty, kitty. Pussy
farm deluxe is coming soon!” she shouted. “You are your own hero. I
am my own hero. Peace and love and happiness, lesbians.
And remember,
where ever you go, you take yourself.”
“Alleluia!” the audience roared.
“Viva Las Vegas!” she yelled back.
“Viva Las Vegas,” they repeated.
A bell rang and the radio station mysteriously went dead.
There was a long moment of silence as Denver and Icky absorbed what
they had just heard.
Denver was the first to speak, “Well, Icky? How do you wipe your ass?”
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