KARMA REPAIR KIT: ITEMS 1-4
By Richard Brautigan
1. Get enough food to eat,
And eat it.
2. Find a place to sleep where it is quiet,
and sleep there.
3. Reduce intellectual and emotional noise
until you arrive at the silence of yourself,
and listen to it.
4.
* * *
Saturday
“Did I do something wrong?”
The waitress chased us out of the Sapphire Hotel.
I wanted to kiss this faux-Ottoman on the mouth for her candor, how ably she summed up the night with her simple question bearing such obvious financial undertones.
But I ran away in the cold, and let Kevin, Asia and her boyfriend console the poor girl.
* * *
Earlier I had suggested we meet at the ripe old age of 6 pm at the Triple Nickel, the smokiest dive on all of Belmont, except for perhaps two other joints, but smoky nonetheless. Kevin kept asking me if I knew what she would look like.
“Well, yeah. She likes Richard Brautigan. I’LL KNOW WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE.”
But by this time the smoke had caused Kevin’s eyes to swell completely shut, as though he had a peanut allergy, and I knew that, indeed, it would be up to me.
* * *
Asia is a fantastic writer, and I was only mildly joking with Jenny and Jill that I finally felt superior in that I would get to meet her first. And when I pretended that I would run up to her with a pair of scissors in one hand and a can of budweiser in the other, in order to get a lock of her hair and give her boyfriend a beer, I was only mildly pretending, too.
I saw pictures of her, mostly blurry, and mostly of her feet, but still, I knew it was her when she came in. Asia is a supermodel. And like most trolls, I AM MOST COMFORTABLE AROUND SUPERMODELS.
* * *
On the sidewalk, I gave mouth-to-mouth to Kevin, so that he could drive me to the Blue Sapphire, because that’s where I told Asia and her beau we would go next. And a funny thing happened. Because Asia and I share so many things, including orange kitchens, a love of slugs (I love slugs), a hatred for pit bulls, a fondness for going to battle with the yellow jackets armed only with charged SE Asian electrorackets, and fascination with dust in sunlight in common, I decided I wouldn’t drink as I normally do.
I think I even specifically told Kevin, “I’m only going to have one drink. Two, tops.”
“What are you having?”
“MMMMM…Maybe this one: ‘Spanish Coffee.’”
(editor’s note – Spanish Coffee is what God cast Satan into at the end of all things)
* * *
June 2017
Purdy Women’s Penitentiary, Gig Harbor
“What’s the last thing you remember, Ms. Rogers?”
“Spanish Coffee.” /breaks into loud sobs
* * *
One time Asia wrote this line: I need slate grey tumult.
Another, she wrote: Not everyone is so charitable. I am not saying that I am. Its just that I like stories.
What’s strange is that it’s relatively easy to scour the web for people who might occasionally write something you’re thinking. But to have them say it in person at the same time is a different line and verse altogether.
“Don’t comments make you, I don’t know, kind of …”
“NEUROTIC!” /in unison
I think it’s at this point in the evening where Asia and I start to divvy up her beau’s Spanish Coffee, which he has wisely abandoned after one sip. I mean, it’s Bacardi 151. The rim is caramelized. It’s a writer’s drink.
* * *
I don’t know if she knows how hard I tried to get the entire staff of NPR, including Ira Glass, fired for not allowing me to interview her for StoryCorps, how many hours I stayed put at my desk, futilely typing in our names and dates, but that’s not the kind of thing you mention while you rush at someone and her 6 foot 2 boyfriend with scissors in one hand and a Spanish Coffee (pre-flamed) in the other.
But I have been leaving puppy-boy comments on Asia’s site long before I was a big-time blogger and the only person(s) who left comments on mine were my good friends Texas Holden and All Night Longley.
At one point, both me and her boyfriend were singing in unison that she doesn’t know how unique an American life she has lived. I swear I didn’t think she would be able to withstand my line of questioning, because for a good solid 90 minutes I asked her every question in the book, and each question led to another, and I completely ignored a very good friend of mine who had arrived on my invitation, one I hadn’t seen in 6 months (sorry by the way, that was wrong). But I like stories, too. And this is a story.
* * *
At another one point I had to explain why I like this deconstructionist so very, very much, and it was hard, but I said the first thing that came out of my mouth that didn’t taste like Bacardi 151 and it was something like, “It’s because you have a voice. I feel like when I was a kid, when I would watch those old Pepsi taste test commercials, that I would be the one contestant who would pick you. That if you hid one of your entries in with a bunch of others, I would pick it.”
* * *
June 1976
I fall on some sort of sharp object and hit my head.
* * *
God! Did you just compare her writing to an entrant in a cola war? Your words are soft…like drinks. I didn’t know swoon looked so much like indignity.
* * *
For a brief time earlier this year, she removed her entire site from public view. I can understand why, because when things go south, you want to pack all your things and head north (or vice versa if you like warm weather; or sideways if you like the water).
But understanding does not mean the same as accepting.
I would like to think that I was the very first person in the entire world to write to her and beg her back into our lives.