Total Perspective Vortex
What really happened to Trillian? Theories abound, but you can see what she's really been up to on this blog. If you're looking for white mice, depressed robots, or the occasional Pan Galactic Gargleblaster you might be better served here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/hitchhikers/guide/.
Don't just sit there angry and ranting, do something constructive.
In the words of Patti Smith (all hail Sister Patti): People have the power.
Contact your elected officials.
Don't be passive = get involved = make a difference.
Words are cool.
The English language is complex, stupid, illogical, confounding, brilliant, beautiful, and fascinating.
Every now and then a word presents itself that typifies all the maddeningly gorgeousness of language. They're the words that give you pause for thought. "Who came up with that word? That's an interesting string of letters." Their beauty doesn't lie in their definition (although that can play a role). It's also not in their onomatopoeia, though that, too, can play a role. Their beauty is in the way their letters combine - the visual poetry of words - and/or the way they sound when spoken. We talk a lot about music we like to hear and art we like to see, so let's all hail the unsung heroes of communication, poetry and life: Words.
Here are some I like. (Not because of their definition.)
Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Smart Girls
(A Trillian de-composition, to the tune of Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys)
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Smart girls ain’t easy to love and they’re above playing games
And they’d rather read a book than subvert themselves
Kafka, Beethoven and foreign movies
And each night alone with her cat
And they won’t understand her and she won’t die young
She’ll probably just wither away
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
A smart girl loves creaky old libraries and lively debates
Exploring the world and art and witty reparteé
Men who don’t know her won’t like her and those who do
Sometimes won’t know how to take her
She’s rarely wrong but in desperation will play dumb
Because men hate that she’s always right
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Life(?) of Trillian
Single/Zero
Sunday, March 14, 2004 Feckless
It's been a while since I've driven a road trip.
I have been itching to just drive. Away.
Those of you who have to drive, every day, probably don't get this. The want, need, desire to get into a car a just drive. I no longer own a car in the city. I publicly transport myself to work, take cabs, walk. When I need a car, or have that urge for a weekend road trip, I rent one.
I've had the urge for a while. I've been formulating plans.
But what I've just endured was not exactly what I had in mind.
I am not going to write about the events or emotions of what I've just been through. There are not words adequate or appropriate. Feckless.
A very, very dear friend's parents were killed in a terrible car accident. From there you can connect the dots and fill in the blanks.
Of course, I dropped everything, rented a car, got out of work as soon as I could Thursday and drove what turned out to be 8 hours to be at the at the memorial service, to "help" any way I could. Mainly, I just had to be with her.
I mean this sincerely. I hope you never get a call from someone you care about deeply, a close friend or relative, who is suffering so greatly that they are not able to speak. And when they do speak they're so overcome with emotion that they choke out words between sobs, or worse, speak from that distant, remote place which makes voices hollow and unrecognizable.
I speak with Frankie a few times a week, we've known each other for years. We've been through a lot together. A lot. The day Frankie and Benjy (her husband) packed up and moved hundreds of miles away was one of the saddest I've had to endure. Happy as I am for their wonderful new jobs, home and life, there is a huge empty place in my life where they used to be. Months after their departure I still forget and dial their old phone number. Yes. Even though I have their new number on speed dial.
I digress.
For me to not recognize Frankie's voice is something I never would have thought possible.
I nearly hung up, thinking it was Stalker Boy or a wrong number or I don't know what.
Then she sobbed out, "TRILLIAN!! It's - it's - this is - it's - FRA - FRANK - FRANKIE!"
I mention this because a lot of me is still frozen back at that exact moment. The moment before I heard The Horrible Thing. The moment before I knew my dear friend was suffering a horrible shock and trauma that will stay with her the rest of her life. The moment before I would be at a complete loss as to what to say or do or think or feel for my friend. Feckless.
And, sadly, that is one of the ways how you know you have a good friend: You feel their pain.
I felt that kick in the stomach, wind knocked out of you, heart pounding so fast you think you're having a heart attack, room spinning out of control, can't breathe feeling. I'm usually quite empathetic anyway, but this was different. This was/is the kind of empathy you have for a few people in your life. The kind of empathy that seems like The Horrible Thing has happened to you personally.
I am feeling her pain. She's suffering, I know, much more than I am, I don't mean to imply I know, can possibly understand, what she's going through.
Though.
Through her, because I know her so well, I think I have a pretty good idea.
I knew Frankie is a good friend. I knew that. And no, I've never taken her for granted.
But unfortunately I learned in a terrible way what a huge place she has in my heart. I learned exactly how much I love her.
After the initial call, I went on auto pilot. Making plans to Get There. Flights were far too cost prohibitive. Bereavement fares are only extended to immediate family. (Feckless) (Which is totally wrong, just unfair and wrong, because sometimes the person you need most in these situations is someone not in your immediate family.) Train? Nope - closest station is an hour from her parents' town, and takes too long anyway. (Feckless) Gotta rent a car. Done. Gotta pack. (see yesterday) Gotta take care of a few pressing issues at work. Then GO!
During all of this I was in contact with Benjy and when she felt like it or needed it, Frankie.
My funny, strong, intelligent, caustically sarcastic, sometimes bitchy, never at a loss for very effective words, always very pragmatic, always able to deal with what life throws her friend was none of those things.
I understand.
But it hurts me to see her hurting. To be unable to find one trace of her. Anywhere. Not one glimmer or spark to hint that she's still in there somewhere.
I left work early, picked up the car and got on the road. For the first few hours of the trip I was in another emotional place. Sort of Road Trip! mode. A new-ish car, just me and radio, rolling down the highway headed for parts unknown. I didn't allow myself to think of the reality of my destination. Oh, I knew where I was going, what was waiting for me at the end of my journey, but I concentrated on driving. Except for a stop for petrol and turns, I think I had both hands gripped at 10:00 and 2:00 on the steering wheel the entire trip. In my haste to pack, I neglected to toss in a few CDs. I played the radio at first, but when I couldn't find anything I wanted to hear, I turned it off. When I pulled into the hotel parking lot nearly 8 hours later I realized I had never turned it on again. I drove 8 hours, stopping only once, gripping the steering wheel, thinking of nothing other than driving, in complete silence.
I realized this only when I got out of the car. It seemed really noisy outside. "Outside," in the parking lot of a small hotel, under a jet black sky, in a small town, at 11:00 at night, when everyone else within 50 miles is asleep or watching the news getting ready for bed. That seemed noisy. My rental car had become my little rolling chamber of silence. In there I was incubated from the world. (Feckless) My cell phone was frequently "out of service area" (Feckless). As I got closer, I was able to reach Benjy, we talked briefly. Other than that, not one word, one song, noise...anything happened in the car.
The "noise" of the parking lot was an alarm clock. "Time to face reality!"
I checked into the hotel where Benjy had reserved me a room. Frankie and Benjy arrived minutes later.
This is where I stop the narrative.
I just can't, shouldn't and don't want to write about it.
Maybe someday. Maybe if/when I can establish a more clear perspective. When I am able to distance myself long enough to understand even a small piece of it, if I have anything valuable to share with the Universe.
This time around I can't observe and report. Feckless.
Someone I care about greatly, love, is hurting because of a horrible, senseless, stupid thing that never should have happened to her parents.
Her parents who both had a lot of life left in them, a lot of things they wanted to do.
I left Frankie and Benjy Saturday morning. Tearful good-byes. Promises to visit soon. Cell phone synchronization. Benjy now, oddly, taking on a slight air of Man of the Family, making sure I had the best, safest route to follow, marking the safe places to stop on my MapQuest printout. I swear he would have slipped me a 20 for petrol if I had stayed a minute longer.
I snigger at that now, even then I was aware of bittersweet humor of it, but I also find it comforting.
Frankie's in good hands
I got into my rolling chamber of silence and back onto the road. This time very aware of the silence. I had been craving it. Me and the road and my silent incubator, viewing the world through windows and muffled silence. For me it seemed the perfect buffer between what I'd just been a part of and the regular world.
And it was.
It was the perfect place to decompress. To mull it all over. To wonder. To hope. To let everything that was starting to sink in take root.
I have always been 50/50 on the purpose of memorial services. The person's dead, for crying out loud, if you didn't say it before they died, well, it's kind of too late now, isn't it?! Feckless!!! I know, I know, they're more for those left behind, and a tribute to the deceased. I respect that.
And I do have a better understanding of that now. I've never fully grasped that side of it, I've always been too close or too removed to understand the subtle things these services "do" for the bereaved.
Having gone through this with Frankie, both with her empathetically, and removed because they're not my parents and my job was to be there for her, I get it. In this case, the memorial was necessary. Real, almost tangible emotional things happened before, during and after the service.
Those words, concepts, I hate so much: Closure. Healing. Usually I find them to be feckless, hollow, overused, inappropriate words for complicated emotional processes. And I still stand by that opinion.
But.
Things happened. Things are happening. Things that would happen a lot more slowly and convoluted had there not been a memorial service.
Before I left, I think I saw a brief spark of Frankie. I'm not certain, but I think I saw a slight roll of her eye when Benjy laid out my MapQuest printout on the hood of the car and pulled his dorky combo pen/highlighter from his pocket.
I rolled along in contemplative silence for about four hours.
I stopped at one of the exits Benjy had highlighted as safe. I put in petrol. Across the street was a McDonalds. I hate McDonalds. I never, ever go there.
Except when they have a sign out front that says, "Shamrock Shakes R Here."
Oh yeah.
Come to mama.
I drove through. I regretted that. The act of rolling down the window cracked a seal in my incubator of contemplative silence. The crackly "Welcome to McDonalds May I Take Your Order" invaded my acoustically pristine chamber. Further tainted it with the "Is That All Today? Would You Like Fries With That?" (no) I got my Shamrock Shake, auto rolled up the window as fast and tightly as I could, as if there were an attacker mere feet away heading for me through the open window.
I motored on my way, safe in my rental anonymity. In my silent world, no one would ever know it was me, Trillian, at a McDonalds.
Back on the highway, driving along, trying to remove the McDonalds auditory taint, I leisurely enjoyed my Shamrock Shake (Swut they're good, every year it pains me to admit it, but swut they're good) I contemplated Shamrock Shakes. McDonalds. Mrs. Kroc who just died. I wondered if she had a daughter. If she nagged her daughter. If her daughter is beyond consolation because her mother won't nag her anymore. I wondered if Mrs. Kroc and Frankie's mother would get along.
And then it came to me. Almost like a vision. Except I heard it. What is it when it's a vision but you hear something instead of see something? An auditory experience? There must be a word for it. The natural counterpart would be "sound" but "I had a sound" doesn't sound right, doesn't imply the same thing as "I had a vision." Yes. Very contemplative times in that car. Back to my auditory experience. My "sound".
One word burned in my auditory psyche: Feckless.
Everything about this whole swutting thing is feckless. How do I feel? Feckless. How does Frankie feel? Feckless. What are my efforts to comfort her? Feckless. The point of The Horrible Thing? None. It's feckless.
Feckless.
A word don't often use, certainly not something in my regular vernacular.
Until now.
Now it seems the perfect succinct summarization for all of it. The whole lot. The Horrible Thing and beyond.
My promotion that isn't: Totally feckless. My broken tooth, pneumonia and insurance coverage accidentally not deducted from my paycheck: Feckless. My payroll, benefits and HR managers and New Boss: Feckless, feckless, feckless and very feckless. HWNMNBS: Well. Yeah. There's a feckless situation if ever I saw one.
Putting The Perfect Word on it satisfied some small need I didn't know I'd been craving. I don't have that need some people have to put a label on everything. It's that this word, spoken so assuredly, so loudly from my psyche describes a lot in my life right now.
And then I wanted to hear music.
I turned on the radio. I hit scan. I played name that tune. (You have to name the title and artist of the song before the radio scans to the next station.) I found a "classic rock" station that actually played rock and not just a bunch of crappy songs from 1973. I yelled along to an AC/DC rock block. I held up an imaginary lighter during the chorus of All the Young Dudes. I said, to no one in particular, "And that is why Eddie Van Halen is the greatest rock guitarist who will ever live!" punctuating the air with my fist like a stoner mullethead. Which scared me, so I scanned onto another station. I found a "hits of the 80s, 90s and today" station. I got there just in time for an 80s super set. "Super" in this case might be a slight exaggeration. I tuned down to the the Public Radio area of the radio. Ahhhh. NPR. "hey!" again to no one in particular, "Mrs. Kroc left NPR a load of money in her will." I toasted what was left of my Shamrock Shake to the radio. Feels like home. For a while. Then I got bored and found a decent low watt college station. Woo hoo! I love good low watt college radio stations! But of course they don't last long when you're just passing through their limited antennae reach.
I was nearing one of the exits Benjy had highlighted as safe. I had plenty of fuel, but was out of Shamrock Shake.
Dare I?
Okay. If there's a McDonalds at the Safe Exit, you exit. But you only get another Shamrock Shake if they have a sign out front proclaiming they have Shamrock Shakes. Because this time you're going in. You're not violating your auditory chamber again. And you want to be certain they have the swutting things. And it will also be a sign that you should allow yourself the sin of another Shamrock Shake.
McDonalds at exit? Check.
Sign out front proclaiming they have Shamrock Shakes? Check.
Right then. This. Means. Something.
It means I am going to park the car, stretch my legs, go inside, use the ladies' room, meekly order a Shamrock Shake and get the swut out of there before someone sees me. One could argue, based on the fat and caloric intake that exit caused me, that it is definitely not a safe exit.
Back in the car and out on the highway, I put the radio on scan for a while, played name that tune. Made it flawlessly to the double point bonus round. Won the undisputed champion title.
Then I slowed things down a bit on one of those "light FM" stations. The ones I never listen to. Not because I don't like them, per se, but because when I want to hear "light FM" style songs I will listen to the "light FM" style songs I like from my own collection. With the exception of Natalie Merchant, of whom it was officially decreed that I find her voice among the top five most irritating ever, I liked and sang along with every song. And that is how I drove back into town and back to life as I know it. Singing light FM songs. Two spent McDonalds shake cups on the floor of the passenger side of a rental car.
