Spring 2004 by Northwestern Michigan College

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.d smiling all Well here you are eating breakfast with a woman who is"not Nancy. She is not in almost every way that so~eone cannot be someone else, and you are different now, too. toy with your Denver omelet while she knocks down her hash browns and bacon and say,

'1'2! plaCL

"Breakfast is my favorite meal to eat out." You watch the waitress drift from table to table, filling up coffee cups and calling the

S~JnoJ

regulars 'Hori' and 'Sport'. She ~ the waitress - absently ~oops the mone -off' avoiding syl'Uppuddles and coffee rings, and deftly stows the small bills in her front apron pocket, all the while keeping up a steady patter of mindless chatter, as if the conversation is what these guys are paying for, not the 'Workingman's Special or the Farmer's Breakfast. Maybe it is. Not too long ago, you were lingering over your last cup of coffee and shooting""the breeze with Tracy every morning down at the Town Griddle,

You'push a little more omelet onto your fork and wonder abQutthe'kst time you ate a.

.,.

meal with a woman who wasn't on a diet. Have you ever eaten a meal with a womanv ho, wasn't dieting? Nancy was always dieting, and she looked terrific, too. There had been a little dating with others, awkward dinners with special requirements: "I'm a vegetarian," or "No bread or pasta". The woman sitting across from you now obviously isn't dieting. She isn't ......

talking,much, either. She smiles over her coffee cup, points out the amusingly hung over couple in the corner booth, and then returns to eating her breakfast, as if you'd done tins a hundred times before..

You pick at the thought of Nancy like a scab. She, you, the we that you were, had been~ enough for a long time - longenough to grow roots and draw blood. You push on the edges of the memory to see if it's still tender. You smile and nod as she gets up to go to the' ladies' room, and think about last night. You can't deny you had harbored a little bit of hope when you stopped by her house unannounced. She had assured you it would be fme, she was always home when she wasn't at work and company never bothered her. "Besides," she said, "if I don't feel like talking I don't answer the door." But she had answered the~or,

apg ~u

drank coffee on her back porch,

~_.,,,,;;~~flll.the..suali~l:rt"futre;1]]ke"a1J;;;;;;w~(orkand books and her gro"m daughters. The

even the best toothy

grin.

Sara was an unfortuJ;te

to,silence

among us, '~~fall into

screams of vuLnez-ab i Li.t.y . her forearms

intentioned

e~ample of inattentiveness

In a haunt.ed moment, she tore

the phantd/Jl voices

Her husband 'found her bleeding

ringing

to the

at. the tender

in her head.

~n the bathroom and drove

He dr opped.caara off in ~front of th~'-s-J:rding~g-laSS Emergency Roomdoors and qu.i.ckLy _d!,oY!L~a

was late ~for;: his tee time. , - .;:,.,- 'I" ~,~- -_ cigarette and wandered inside 4<' __

~'l;".

She qu.i.e t.Ly gave ~her name-<atthe reg.istratiort that

and dripped tile

-door

The firs{ last,

made very little off

sense. to her.

her fingert*ps,

beneath

desk and answered

Thick drops of blood' flowed down

echoing

loudly

as they splashed

her feet

~hiJigs the hospital

her freedom.

Ln-.a -:!;J:.l,ick~e"l:ou<:l""1!>f~"~-

"",~~-~:;,.m->;:"'"-"':

~Ok from Sara were her purse and car f,

She was escorted

from the registration

desk by a

,'I;

d~sembodied hand that o~servation

room. pati;~t

her elbo~ldown a cold sterile

broken-~eIng

baby cradled

'by

tenffira'to

with a nurse seated

in th~larms a te~ ,I

of a cooing doctor,

symp~tnetic

,- ."

could not really

cleared. thwart

orthopedics.

Sunshine

They patted

"-'-~

and murmured sootl)i~_ ..w~rd~':~

Sara was shoved through, the door of the it

patiently

and womanwith

stopped by each room and as:)j:ec,}1,after the pat Lent, comfort.

shoulders

that

hallway to an

ro;~~ .-~; ~5ne~ passed by.

Sara glanced into ,,,ter c;onnec~ed to a heart~nitor

a crying

nurses

pulled

be c'anstrued

A uniformed hospital

the starched

until

white sheet

sar a harbored of the' cold,

1:':t-f

her,

when' her

th~ doorway to

no such :l.ntentions

and

hard hosPiJal \beQ rubbing

'_,

tc;t"'t'l~er_-".g,8_lookingdown tha"h~ll ,a-tothe __ confusion ---____

room ini such

later,:

secu+,ity guard stood outside

ved es~ape ~plb~.

any ill~concei

observation

as hostile

of "octor],?!and nurs

I"'z_

all ~i1'!'fa:t:;;.t2~_great a hurry to stop ;in and speak to her. Mari~

fame in

and ordered

Sara to remove

!;:__1~L£1.9j;_h~Ltlg_..arld,,-p1ae~H~-±rr-'tlf!"--_'Beat ;J:<'s:t;~~'bag Sh~\~~t;ia11~

She

gown with snaps .;in. the back' to, chan,&e,,'into and -a' ~~_

pla~tic

specimen cup.

watchful

eyes.

Sara stripped

scars

apathy and outright

deeply when Sara removed her shirt, on her arms.

a Ripley's,

~-.

~::f -'''-Y~"'-i~,'

l'Iintl'of';·the

nurse'

Marilyn stood with folded arms and an

somewhere between.pity, sighed

under the cold steel

Believe

loathing. exposing

Marilyn looked at her as if It cor Not

blood onto the bed sheet

and

She shook the massive collection

she were some sort

museum. The naked wounds on Sara's floor

below.

arms

stuffed

them with wads of cotton

Then s he watched Sara rell,e,(e herself

arms.

â&#x20AC;˘. I

After

plastic

cup in the

~ bathroom. ,,'

in the little

an hour or so, ~h,e doc;.~orwho had held the baby so tenderly

ripped

~, ~ away the gauze and stabbed ~e~~~es-1illed with lidocaine into each of the ~ _.,~ twenty-seven razor slashes. rt 'tQ.oklhim nearly an hour and a half to complete

,.J # ~

se~enty-eight ~didn't

~~I

sutures\and

bother

by then th~ an~sthetic

to mention she was in ~ain ..

the cuts were her own damn fault

had long worn off.

l~didn't

Sara

seem to matter much since

an~y.

The dootor spoke perhaps three~\sentences

during the enthf~,prQJ;~du~-and _~_;""'--e'""'"~~

abruptly

left

with the pronouncement t~at

the nurse bring them to her. wounded.

Sara didn't

bother to remind him that

she was truly

sick and

Four hours had passed since she fntered ~ emergency services her;

Sara tried

s'lenced

the observation

the voices

why she had\cu:

and that

the release'

herself.

she~felt

She mentioned that

when she cut was ether her

a peculiar

from the more excruciating

winced.

She actually

The~urses seeke'-

,____

had five different

"God, not another Bo.::de,rline!" mental health

'door.

The--eme'~ency services ward.

â&#x20AC;˘

Sara was grateful

,.iR.arette before ~he

hours b~~k~e'jWas_ ,

a wheel chaf.r, up the elevator

'i'

security

legs but the orderly ,made her ride

They stopped in front re

. ~p

of a heavy wooden"

sign announcin<;J:,Elopement

bell' ~nd 'a'~sJllall, 'suspfcious ,...,

regarded them through the Jll;{~dOW. Sara, was hastily-s'hoved doo/'closed _.

guard who

It wOJ;JJ.d.-be-ar-'-

allowed another: ...... """~~---

S~ra's

anyway

rang/the

to::the

went; i:iP~'aJ,"\q;.

'th

wi~dow and a large The orderly

and manipUlative attention-

worker deciped~'to admit her to Center One, the

There was nothing wrong

Precautions.

"-'"-

-,"~

twenty-four

diagn~ses ,.--.buc'-.

/'-?,

:.r' ._- .......

to'1mo ~

Disorder-made her the scourge of the medical community.

~ust outs'ide Sara's

her outside

her wounds were not

form of self-preservation;

'whispered wO~d~like hostile,~sistant

hOS;f'tai~clti~tric

sweet.

pain in her head.

'out, in the hallway the nurse's gossiped,

Borderline Personality

to it

impu{s-{vene"s~s but she

that They were actually respite

room when an

worker from CommunityMental Health came Ln and talked to explain

Sara now regretted

least

ders and have

T-henhefwas off to care for the

too.

he' would draw up some

LookLnq woman

through the doorway

with an ominous click.

I a

:.P~Ntt'tst,,·< ... -._-

!. i;\{fij '~. ~ V;\I~,-~ I

Franchised Dreams

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Clockwork automatons I c;L, __ ~ »> Feasting in the black heart __- ." . __ - _- ._ Of entropy machinery '", -....... ~--- ~Ji.' ----rl Center of a death force , -- __,,?-o _.-}__Malignant cancer factory - - - __- _::;..~/ Where gro~ is sacrificed . :,~d"-"" -. In the face of ins\antaneo~ }lD(yty The truth is sacrificed In the face of endless distraction

. Since when does a coupon pave the way to ~ness Prozac·induced contractionsquickeninsyour.~~ As you muJtiply exponentially Squealing children raised in the fast.~.l . Of crippling urban sprawl .' Dimes traded away For artificial nursery rhymes Lulling you into a deeper state of uncOnsciousness A puppet imbued with pragmatio apathy Indifference has become Virtuous So close off the orifices of your su:frering souls Shield yourself from life and bottle it Sell it back to your children for the profit Inject it into plastic and target your market Partition your spirits Sell.yourself until you are owned to the eoi» Properly transform into property Redefine what it means To be a real red-blooded American whore

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. ltt3:tn alive

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'. 1: want.t~~o life tight . ~gi1t out lOUd.

1:lel~'I1le:

ti,iuni.l nan '? got ~

(lilt of "".,..

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~This all started at a given time, and in a given place. I think, for now, it is best to sum itup with a feeling. Or, if not a feeling, perhaps a desire.. I needed to know who I ".,_,

"',_

â&#x20AC;˘â&#x20AC;˘

was, and how I got here. Most of all, I needed to know what made mediffei'ent fromthe rest of them. The question

that keeps coming to mind is this: do I have a soul? .: Is there ;o-;-;;e,tfi~~ets

they eye?

This won't be an end, but it will be a beginning. A starting point. A place from which to observe the passage of time, and its effect upon me. I think, the only way

fJ;:y:ou

to better understand what I am getting at is to tell you

about the moment when I woke up, when I was granted insight. That fateful day, the one that changed me forever, that day I saw 33 McDonald's arches, and 14 billboards. I was on my way to work, or maybe on my way home. It is unbeljevably easyto forget these things, if you're not careful. I was the puppet of my re~ote control, paying tribute to the gods of distraction. When everything is automatic, thinking becomes more of an a1ut0yancewith each passing day. That's precisely why I've been conditioned to get along with out it. Life jia&.~o.e~;;b~Ck then. No second-guessing. Peacefully celebrating the annihilation of . ..... ,.~ .. ,

-_-;'_

-\"

decision making, Creativity had long sense been trumped by the multiple guess way of~oing things. Take your pick, a, b, c, or

None of the above)' All of the above. There is no wrong answer h~re. It's just a matter of

preference. Which letter form mOsr~ppealsto you and why? This is what~passesfoT';:kee;;{;; these days. :". '--

.~-..

-,_-_-,<._- - ~~

I saw 25 Wal-Mart ads, All those smiling.yellow faces delighted me so.

-'?!-

It was the construction that did it. Bless those orange and yellow clad workers.

Without them my

enlightenment might never have come. I believe I was running late. Too far behind the pace my schedule set for me that day. Whether I was late for dinner or the job has yet to be deciphered. I remember that the roadwork created feelings of anxiety, feelings ..of ?~~--

l;ltih11f

'-~'~i"'_;~(

panic. My chest tightened, my heart beat quickened, my stomach cramped, my. "_-_._-

head pounded, my eyes throbbdf,:'How I felt, is that I wanted to scre~;ri. 'To start screaming and to never stop.

l>!.0t-

until law enforcement came and ripped out.my vocal cords. My black SUY",~~9wedto a crawl, and }hen halted completely. I saw 356 black sport utility vehicles. Each one barreling from point A to point B. The fastest route between two places is no longer a straight line. It's a winding path up ramps' and down ,

ramps, over bridges and under them. It is a path dict~ted bylights and signals. Like commandments from above the signs control our every motion. My dreams ru:e drawn in dotted yellow lines, and refl_::ctivePAint Sitting-there, unable to proceed, my living was halt~d. ' And for ';hat? The filling in of potholes perhaps. This is what is called routine maintenance. This is what is called a work in progress. It occurred to me, sitting there, readjusting the controls governing the conditioned air I was greedily sucking in by the lung full, it occurred to me that this construction-was going nowhere. Since the invention of roads this has been a never-ending process. Nothing was ever fixed, it was just forgotten about until next summer. Wherever there is road being built; five old ones are being repaired. And so it has gone, and so it will go.

In our modem, automated world, the one problem we've never solved is how to fix a road for good, without our automobiles tearing it up again."A§t1' thought about tbis, the idea of civilization became increasingly worthless to ,/1;<' ,

.."

Nothing is ever solved, just patched up s'p,we can go on living itcreasingly empty lives. Oh, and by the way, did I -;:"~-'

~~ ...

mention that tbis feeling of hopelessness t!ia¢'overcame me out on that industrial super highway was the first real

I saw 18 Nike billboards. Each equipped with its own visually appealing swoosh,

bein&;,:",aved_~orward. I was being commanlie~. -¥

(."1:

And, altho~~1i;,-;{, obeyed by pressing down on the gas, it was

~,-

....

already too late. -The damage had been done. 1,. d'IEtlt what I perceiv.e_flas true emotion. become conscious.

I had woken up. I had

~'" ::.;~

'Il

-o-r-:

That fateful day, I saw 125 ads for various'typ~lofundergarments. .omprehend how much of a life-changing event this was I'll have to give a little more back':

e. For that, I think

-nformation. :'-~

.....

I was a hollow shell. An-empty ·~hing. . ~~ .

A vessel ready to be filled with whatever I was told I needed. They

say we've always been thisway, but ~'dhis point in time, I no longer believe it to be true. The food I ate tasted the same as the food my neighbors ate. It was all treated with the same chemicals, made in a laboratory in New Jersey. They let me read books here sometimes, and I have learned that this fact about food also hasn't always been true. I'll let you in on my biggest discovery so far: the truth abol_ltmy appearance. People didn't always look like I . do. We used to come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, we had different facial features and our skin came in shades other -"\,,,

than pale white. However, the wonders of genetic engineering eliminated all of that long ago. It hurt~;}ny head to imagine how someone else could appear differently. After all, with nothing to reference.to, and no pictures to look at, it is hard to form a mental image.

Genetic engineering supposedly started as a Way to 'eat whatever we>';';'~nted •

"'@o

whenever we wanted. I wouldn't know, those things seem far-fetched to.,u . My biggest choice food-wise i~ whether .or not to Supersize something.

,«/:;;;':;:'1.'1.,

~1,'I:\ .

I saw 25 Gap outlets, and 42 Gap ads. I've also read that in fhe old days that there were many different siyles and ways of dressing. Once again, I can neither confirm nor deny this. All my life, there bas only been the Gap, I think you are starting to understand.

The key to being ignored is to blend in. The key to a happy life is

monotony. Diversity only leads to disheartenment. This in tum creates chaos. I heard once, that there were two types of humans .. A male and female counterpart, both necessary to reproduce. Now we are all asexual. When more of us are needed, more.are.created-e lf-there are toe many ofUS:---weare recycled for later use~ This helps us to focus on our car~"?s, the key.to fulfilling our destinies. How else will we gain

completion? As for my particular career, if you care to know, it was to fill out the forms. I don't, and didn't, know what they pertained to. There were simply a series of lettered blanks, which corresponded to long strings of numbers that scrolled across my computer screen. I transferred the numbers from the screen onto the paper, and then filed the forms.hy ~acing them in the chute for outgoing paper work. Repeat this for eight bours a day, five days a week, 52 weeks ayearalld you've got my job.

>7t>

»,

There was no pain or thought involved with any of this. the sun or the wind or the acid rain.

There were no feelings of frustration

Dr anger Dr guilt. ,--,

thirs~,J~:·ank. completely

Any emotion

was drowned

with injection ~cld-;;;niappj"ness..that_there

emotion, and we were never meant to create.

J was

When

hungry,

I filled up my mind SD

out with my prescribed" pills.

was no room fof anything else} We were never meant to convey

We only consume.

It is our purpose,

nothing could be clearer than

that. That day, I watched two hours of epileptic television;'

Part of me wishes I could go back to the time wh\:n everything ,-

predictable,

nothing was questioned Rrl!-mknown.

fit:; ,":"__

controlled

and calculable.

psychological

However,

-_<;;~,;{

efficiency,

OUf

was

time. My life was

'ii_£'

T~:seweren't

emotions.

This was

~. "

my yearning

These emotions

Everything

,~~ \,·'fi"-

is the ultimate a"Sl(l~"femel1tof

I was tl~j§li.ijiing example of self-sufficient

conditioning.

was so plain and simple.

,__-~,

Stan.dardization

for the past grows smaller even now.

I am enjoying this new way of experiencing

that arise from the internal, no matter how inefficient;

are much more real to me :t1i1n what had

been dictated by the external. ljmagine

that there was a time when-cultures

.'.

didn't mean the extinction our differences, answer.

not in our similarities.

Don't

where diverse,

complex,

and unpl,@dictable .

".:

of an entire species, but'just/one aSkme"why

.' ',' •

small group.

fii

I imagine a tim~~hell.

1 have come t6 think tl"\esethings;

beauty v::as foundin

I co.i!Id noq~jye

It is just something that makes sense to me. I saw 14 Shell gasoline stations. After I got through the traffic jam, I don't recall much up to the accident

the illusion

of progress,

and the hopelessness

of going nowhere

destr~y all of the irratio~o~nd

As I thought more and more about

in faster and bigger automobiles,

me. I jerked the wheel of my SUV wildly backward

and forward.

two signs, ran into the slde:0AA.abridge, bounced off and collided head on WIth another automobile.

•

a black sport utility vehicle:

i'5ii.

'Its driver

I only wanted to •

kn9.:kem· over

Of courseit

too was

was killed instantly.

The brains that were splattered now smashed. in useless head was only

all over the outside of my windshield,

a. dead .'

I knew, looked just like my own.

I survived, '"version- of-myself. . eir seat belt.

of broken plastic

trapped

and sheered metal. The.other driver hadn't been ~earingt

-This was n~ typical. . This is what the machines call a glitch. .

Before I lost consciousness

The next thing I remember is this, its proper places.

Everything

:.'......

I saw one moreset ofgolaeD:-arches.

'it should

I was lying in a hospital bed,' pieced back together, or~anic matter back in

be, waiting to be filled with comme;cialized

my place in the eternal pecking 'order, a docile servant easily subverted putty.

and controlled,

cannon fodder. like malleable

I felt no pain due to the drugs being fed to me-via IV. My vital signs-were being monitored,

tell from watching ER, they appeared to be normal. "That day I saw 67 ads for mood enhancing drugs. ,I have been taking Prozac since I was created, just like everybody else .:

Ready to take clay, or silly

and as far as I could

/",.~'/~'~~_", ~

c,~

"~..

''''i~

It was through my delirium that the revelations really began, ~ch

we view life. Nothing is linear; everything is cyclical, as we exist in multiple overlapping dimensio~;,;':(;i"fe

feeds upon life. Society is a mask that blinds us to the implicit trlth~':.>fthe world in which we live. 233 signs told me to stop and 213 signs told me to go .My

completely unraveled.

,~"aiinlillll;v.:.~!!!:!~~lunderstand,

none of us' have cried in a very long time. machines to the fact that I had regained consciousness; it also let them

This, 'of cou~Y<tlertecLtbJ: know that I had begun to feel.

I no longer kne\t what to do, or who to trust. I began to cry, loudly and

This w~n't~~ood

thingin any way, shape,

or form.

Within moments' I was

surrounded, five machines had rushed into my room around my bed. Now tbese weren't the worse kind of machines by far, they were simply repair machines specifically charged with fixing broken people. However, any machine that sees you conveying emotion is bound to be very concerned, and word of your slipup will most definitely reach enforcement and governmental machines. Those types of machines are ~very

kind at all

e'e~

Before I could protest, not that I could do much lying inert in a hospital bed, I w,as injected with~'l.,'!;edative and blacked out once more. When I came to, I was in a very dark room, stretched put on

table in front of an inquisitor machine. Mostly

cnnsrrucreu of instruments designed to inflict pain, seeing an inquisi'cfr machine definitely didn 't help my mood any.

"You have been charged with imperso~~\ing a machin~, by pretending to be able to convey trq~jemotion. -

~~;

.How do you plead?" "But, I really can feel, [ really cane Perhaps

am just a machine trapped in

ebody of a human! Please, you

must believe me!" Out shot a saw, and promptly sawed through my pinky finger. I let out a scream, writhing in anguish. "Again I ask, how do you plead?' Unwilling to risk the loss of any more digits, I gave it the reply it wanted. door to my dark torture cham~er opened, to admit two law enforcement machines, but before they could take me away 1 began to yell something they-didn't expect. "I have a soul! soul!"

...,-

r hav""ll'soull

I have a soul!

Ignonhg me for the moment, they began to consult with each other. "This human is obvio "How can it possibly

eranged than we thought." soul?"

ything but a.machine to have a soul!" "Thing;:};;ve alway; been' that way, it should know that. "This is most unusual"

"--~-=---------~

And that is how I ended up here. Where exactly here is, I'm not so sure. I know I~et food and water, and .1:

sometimes they let me read My room is nothing to speak of; it consists of a bed and cement Walls.. The door is always -:r},."-

'>.~

locked, and there are cameras .monitoring my every move. â&#x20AC;˘

Every once in a while the ma''6!imes enter and ask me

â&#x20AC;˘

questions .â&#x20AC;˘ I suppose I am more valuable as a living study than as recycled flesh. '

. .

And on that fateful day, that day I woke up, I didn't see a single tree. Am I just the reincarnation of a machine in a human's body, or can a human really express emotion? Even

241

with all the reconditioning, there is one question that still haunts me at night. Th*"one unanswerable question, still away at me and driving me insane.

" ~