New and shining stairways,
Stairways worn and old,
Where rooms are prison places
And corridors are cold ...
It's like that topic that keeps surfacing with your mom or dad, and every time it appears both you and them get upset by it -- they don't like your girlfriend or think you wear your hair a little too long these days, and please, are you ever gonna finish what you started and do something with yourself? You listen because you have no choice, and you leave, slam a door or two, probably say a few things you wish you hadn't, and you're off to that place you like to go, to do the thing you most like to do.
Only this is supposed to make you feel better, because here, in this spot are the people and ideas that reassure you of who and what you are, people who understand your point of view, this place that has brought so much sanctity that you begin to rely on it a little too much. And you grow resentful of time, and what it grants you -- only these few moments where you feel at ease, but knowing that your mother or father or significant other is at home sobbing over the things you said, trying to convince themselves that yes, they really do understand you and you really should learn to listen more often.
And you really don't like thinking about all that. You like not having to explain yourself, and only grow more resentful when you do, because there you are, seeing yourself trying to explain that idea or conduct or rationale that you feel so strongly about, and the opponent is there, just looking onward, and you can hear the thoughts coming from his or her body, reassuring you that you don't know what the hell you are talking about, that Oscars really do go to the best performances and best films, and really only the most deserving writers get published and on the best seller lists, and only the best songs are heard on the radio -- why else would they be on the radio then if that weren't the case? It's not about popularity, dammit -- only someone as naïve as you could ever think such things, anyway.
And so you stand there, in your outside sphere, away from the argument, be it a stairwell or balcony or department store or bookstore, gathering your mind for a beginning to something. After all, this is your movie and you hate sappy endings, and you think that this is not how the film would have turned out if you had directed it. Instead it's that bitch called circumstance, that old-fashioned thing called bad luck, and you really are the only one there -- off by yourself who has become a victim of it. Goddammit, you think, shaking your hands trying to rid yourself from this predator they like to call life. And just imagine how pathetic you really are, and how you really haven't amounted to shit compared to your high school classmates who are already married to a nice guy or girl, own their own home, and are making a whole hell of a lot more money that you do. And it's just this fucking world that won't cease, and if you only had the opportunity and chances like everyone else has had, and only if the world and the people understood you better would things begin to get good again. But they don't, and things won't ever be the way that they should.
Airports are like stairwells. They are their own entity, their own crossing that enables you to stand inside of one without actually belonging to anything. Anyone can pass through an airport. Anyone can pass through a city. But airports are so much a sphere in their own right that you can go to any airport in the world without actually having been to the city. Think of every time you've ever asked this question, and what the response has been.
"Ever been to Chicago?"
"Just the airport."
See? The airport is something separate from anything else, just as a stairwell. What exactly are these beings, and did whoever invented them know they would end up this way, so independent, belonging to nothing? One cannot officially say, "I've been in building XYZ" until he or she has actually been in building XYZ, walking though the halls, visiting the rooms, waiting in the lobby. The stairwell, in itself, doesn't count. The same can be said for highways, for having driven through a city is not the same as actually having visited that city, walking around, seeing the sights, et cetera. But airports and stairwells are comfortable bridges that can take you to anyplace you'd like on the "other side," whatever that is. But as long as you are inside one of them -- browsing through the airport gift shop, or wandering up and down floors, you would not have to choose between cities or rooms. You wouldn't have to feel like you were letting anyone down for choosing one friend over another.
I don't remember the first time I flew on a plane, because for as long as I can recall, I've always been traveling on them. Philadelphia morning. Airport. January. The baggage claim is early, and I already have everything I'll need for the weekend. And here I am, waiting to visit a college friend I haven't seen for a while, my first time to Philly, the city of "Brotherly Love," even though I wait outside the airport on the cold January metal bench waiting for my ride -- I can still run inside and catch the next plane to Minneapolis, because that's where I just flew in from, and at this moment, I'm still safe, and if I run back inside I can still claim that I've never been to Philadelphia. Washington D.C.? Yes. Many times. Baltimore? Yes. Lived there. Done that. Why then have I not managed to make it to Philly?
My stomach is growling from that peanut butter sandwich I made in the early morning, that was just supposed to be a snack because I hated airplane food, and pulling it out of the fresh, plastic zip-lock bag, the smell had bled onto the bread, lifting to my nose, and smelling like Glad Wrap Bags. There is nothing really that interesting I have to say to my friend. Things are the same old same old. We used to be so comfortable around each other, and what was this nervous feeling I had, wondering what we would talk about in the car ride on the way to her apartment? Could this all just be blamed on that thing called time?
I brush it off, knowing that all this is silly and of course we will have loads to talk about. And just as I think once again, trying to imagine what I might think if she had my life, "oh you really should get out more," or "have you ever tried this brand of chai," and wondering if I would have as many fresh tips to share with her as she does with me.
Now it's college, 1997. I share a room with my friend who will live in Philadelphia in a few years, and who I will visit one January morning. Dayton has a lovely airport. Very small, but not tiny. There are no troubles when trying to find my gates -- this is not Chicago or Dallas. On one of the walls is a painting of the Wright Brothers with their flying machine. Daytonians must be proud. On the way to the baggage claim there is another poster of them, and underneath reads "Welcome to Dayton, Ohio. Buckeye State." At first I admit to not knowing what the hell a buckeye is, but it's this small little black thing, berry-like, or maybe they really are berries that grow on Ohio trees. Another berry Ohio is famous for is what we liked to call "shit berries," in that these small, salmon-colored bombs about the size of a walnut would fall from the trees, and when smashed, would smell like rotting feces. Granted, I don't know what rotting feces are supposed to smell like over say, regular feces, but that's just what we all liked to say.
"Do you smell those berries?"
"Shit, man. It smells like rotting feces."
I liked Ohio. Not as pretty as Minnesota, but not as pretentious either. There weren't any impressive lakes, but the people were nice. I should have realized that more when I lived there, but when you come from a city like Dallas or the East Coast, it is easy to condescend to a few harmless Ohioans. Only after living in Minneapolis and experiencing the likes of The Pedaling Midwesterners did I beg to reconsider my opinion regarding Ohio. I liked Ohio. Home of Hart Crane -- but I'm sure most of the locals wouldn't know that, anyway. A friend once told me that Ohio had a larger out pool of people than any other state. When I asked what she meant by that, she said that more people leave Ohio after they graduate than any other state. And I responded with "that's too bad," trying to give sympathy to myself for having chosen to go to school there. But you have to at least give these Ohioans credit. At least if they didn't like something, they left it. The same can't be said for Jackson, Mississippi or Ames, Iowa. There people just seemed to stay, which makes me believe that there was something in the South and Midwest that made people stay their whole lives in one place. But obviously Ohio was immune to that fact.
1997. I am in the Dayton airport, seeing off my boyfriend, who I will break up with in a year, and who likes to play with dolls. Okay, maybe not dolls, per se, but action figures. He collected action figures (er, dolls) while I collected memories.
"Oooohhh, Ohio. It's so the place to be," my doll-collecting beau would say, waving his fingers in the air. He lived in Texas and was flying back after visiting me in old Ohio.
"Texas is so much better. Texas. Just listen to the sound of the word. It has character. But Ohio, Ohio is so bland," he'd add.
"Bland? Welcome to the American Midwest. How 'bout Kentucky?" I ask.
"What about it?"
"People here seem to think that Ohio is at least better than Kentucky, and for that they're proud," I say.
"Ick. I will never live in Kentucky," he said while sounding out the word. "Kent-tuck-ee. Kent-tuck-ee. Just listen to it. Even the sound of the state is gross. Yuck, forget it," he would reassure me.
"I want to live in Peru," he'd add, noticing a roll of the eyes from me.
"Don't be a snob," I'd remind him. "Ohio's not that bad." And he would nod slightly and agree.
"Hey, are you implying that I'm that guy in that story of yours?" he asked, referring to my recent short story publication in the Daytonian Daily.
"Jezebel, do you think that guy is me, that I'm really that vain?" He was always very insecure.
"Of course it's not you," I said. And it wasn't. It was a story I wrote about a vain artist guy who gets turned into a maple vanity chest. An homage to Kafka, I'd like to think.
And as much I would hate for my doll-collecting beau to be correct about Ohioans, a few moths back when my friend from Kentucky (who would later live in Philadelphia and I would visit one January) and I went to the grocery store, my friend was writing out a check, so as a result, had to show her driver's license.
"Oh Gawd. I ain't never seen a license like that before," the check out woman said while looking at the Kentucky license.
"Well, in Kentucky, they use our social security numbers for our driver's license numbers," my friend reassured.
"Well out there in Kentucky they do things a whole lot different, I guess," the woman cashier said. My friend looked flabbergasted.
"Out there in Kentucky? I live in Louisville, which is only like two hours from here," my friend reassured the woman.
"But I tell ya, I ain't crossed that river since I was married, and we were just kids then. No mam, you won't ever find me over that river. People are jus' weird down there," she said. My friend just rolled her eyes, and I had to reassure her to not feel insulted. The woman was nice, but sort of white trash. A few other similar things happened, where when living in Minneapolis, I went to St. Paul (which was only like twenty minutes away), and when I wrote a check for the furniture I was buying (this was in a furniture store) the woman had a similar reaction.
"Oh Gad. Minne-ah-po-lis. I haven't been over the river in twenty years. Gad. I never want to go over there!" the woman reassured me, in the chance I might be worried she would. She had one of those thick Minne-soda accents that could slice the air. Christ, if my checks had said I lived in Dallas and she freaked out -- that would be one thing. But St. Paul versus Minneapolis? Give me a break.
"I want to live in Ohio for the rest of my life," my freshman year roommate said.
"Why would you want to do that?" I asked.
"Because I hate the South. I hated living in Memphis. All those Negroes started moving in the city, and my parents just had to leave. We got scared," she said. She was a fat slob who I never got along with, and the only real thing we had in common was that we both lived in Memphis for a time. I would also find her in a variety of moods. For example, before getting into the shower, I'd find her jumping around the room with random joy. Then by the end of my shower she'd be lying in the corner of our dorm room in the fetal position crying. She did not make my first year of college very fun.
I check my watch, and my friend should be picking me up any minute. The bench was cold, so I decided to walk around a bit so I wouldn't freeze. This was Philadelphia in January, after all. My stomach grumbled. I reached in my bag and pulled the leftover sandwich I had made before leaving this morning. By now the edges of the bread had grown hard, and the peanut butter was more solid, rather than soft and sticky. I took a bite and noticed that the bread still smelled like the Glad Wrap Bag. I forced myself to chew, and wondered what my doll-collecting beau was up to now. Probably engaged to some doll-collecting chick. My short story, Vanity, was one of the first few publications I received that made me proud. I know at least fifty people must have read it. Jezebel Retzel, the writer. Yes, like Pretzel without the P.
1985. My mom and I are in the Florida airport waiting to pick up my grandma. I look over and see a homeless man being asked to leave the area. He must have been cold and wanted a place to stay. But apparently this was upsetting to some of the passengers. This was Florida in December, and yes, even here it could get cold. But being homeless and cold in Florida was not quite the same as being homeless and cold in Chicago, the place where my grandma was flying in from. Every year when she came to visit, she would bring presents from all the aunts and uncles. It was like a post Christmas Christmas. I loved it, and always made sure to ask how much each item cost.
All I know is that childhood spoils Christmas. Its like seeing a movie in a trilogy, and the first two films are pretty good, even great, but then when you come to watch the third, and see how the ideas are a little more stale, like the old sandwich in the plastic bag -- not as exciting or filling as the others, but it will satisfy your craving for the two hours while it occupies you. Christmas was sort of the same. Not that it's bad when you're an adult, but compared to the first few years of life, it's a big let down. I always knew that I would be grown when it became just like any other day. And before you know it, the same starts to happen to your birthday, and then you're twenty-seven, visiting your old grandma who used to be able to walk as fast as you, but now just can't get over that limp, and it's visiting her one holiday and seeing a few family members that you look forward to more than getting up early to unwrap some boxes containing items that you probably didn't want anyway.
When she arrives, and we hug her, I can still feel the Chicago cold lingering on her jacket.
"Hi sweetie. Grandma's missed you so much," she'd say. And I'd hug her and tell her the same. Once we get home, I begin opening presents, hoping that I'll get that punk rocker Barbie that I've wanted for so long, the one that my mom just wouldn't buy because after November it becomes "wait for Christmas," again and again. After several presents, I open the one gift I've been craving, and there it is in front of me, my very own punk rocker Barbie, accessories and all. And then I reach up for Grandma and give her a big thank you hug and then proceed to ask how much the item cost.
"Grandma, how much did this cost?" I ask. Grandma laughs.
"Jezebel, don't ask grandma that. It's a gift. That's rude," my mom tells me, but still my curiosity proceeds.
"How much?" I ask again.
"Ten dollars and eighty-three cents," my grandma says while laughing. My mom seems to be taking this more seriously, like I'm just being too rude, but grandma seems to get a kick out of the whole thing.
And then finally taking the doll out of the case, grandma snaps a photo of me, holding the doll, which will go on her wall, and I will revisit, years later. Remembering that I'll always love this Barbie, and play with her every day, until enough time passes and I can't remember if ever I had her at all.
The Florida homeless guy is still in my mind. He was someone's child once, so whatever happened to him? I'm not trying to imply that I feel the typical liberal guilt, but it's sad to think that we need to see others in worse conditions in order to feel good about ourselves. Just look at the poor homeless guy hovering in the corner. Do I do anything about it? Maybe I give him a dollar. But does that really do anything? Maybe we blame him for the way he ended up. "You know, he's had the same opportunities as everyone else. Why should I feel bad about how his life turned out?" someone might say. Maybe he has had all the opportunities as everyone else. Maybe he hasn't. I'm still sitting on the cold metal bench, waiting for my college friend to pick me up. And I nibble on that hard-crusted peanut butter sandwich that to any homeless guy would be a feast. Maybe I should have given him some money. "No way man, never give those people money. They'll spend it all on booze and drugs," someone else might say. And they might be right. Or maybe not. A dollar here or there can't really hurt. Just don't get anywhere near them -- they might attack you, or try to steal your money. They all like to wave those "God Bless" signs, but what do they really mean by that?
I have to say that I felt more sorry for the homeless people living in Minnesota than anywhere else. In the winter it gets so damn cold, there isn't anywhere to go. A friend of mine, Karen Ann, once tried to go on this weekend expedition where you try to learn what it's like to feel homeless. She was given five dollars to last the whole weekend and then had to sleep on the street, finding a nice cardboard box for a bed. When she wanted to use the bathroom at a movie theatre, they wouldn't let her in to use it. And then she got offended when I told her that sleeping out in the street for a weekend wouldn't make anyone learn what it felt like to be homeless, because once the weekend was over, you could go back to your comfortable dorm rooms and write your composition on "what it really feels like to be homeless," when really the only way to know what it was like to be homeless was to actually be homeless. But then she told me to imagine what it would be like to not have anywhere to go or anything to do or have anyone expecting me for a visit. And I just said that yes, she might have experienced that for two days, but in the end, Karen Ann knew it would only be for two days. That's the difference.
She said it was something we should all learn, so we could know what it was like, to be homeless. And I admit that that was not something I wanted to know was like. All in all, I thought the exercise had a lot of heart but no brain. She should have spent the weekend in a soup kitchen or dug through her old clothes to donate, rather than just laying around the streets waiting for a feeling that no one would ever ask to feel.
Philadelphia airport. January. I am still waiting for my friend to arrive. A man has pulled up his car beside the curb. A woman is standing to greet him. They embrace. He helps her with her bags, loading them in the trunk. I can tell by their hug that they are not dating. Probably family -- brother or sister, or just good friends. He helps her in the passenger side of the car and he closes the door. He walks around the other side to let himself in. I'm sure they will have lots to talk about in the car ride to his house. It does not seem to be that much time separating the two of them. Would that I be so lucky with my friend. At least they were better off than the homeless guy, in that they had somewhere to go and someone waiting.
Another woman is signaling for a cab, and the cabby does the same thing that the other man did, minus the hug. The cabby greets the woman and places her bags in the trunk. She shows him what appears to be a map, and the man nods. He knows just where she needs to go. She gets in the back seat because she does not know the man and would prefer to ride alone. The car takes off and the exhaust puffs out from the back of the car like clouds because the air is so cold. I rub my hands together through my gloves to keep them warm. I donÕt want to wait inside for fear that she wonÕt see me, so I continue to sit on the cold bench and be cold. Just then a car drives up and we recognize each other. She gets out of the car and is thin and blonde. We hug, and she too puts my suitcase in the trunk. But before entering her car, I dash to the trashcan, where the half-eaten sandwich is no longer appetizing, and throw it away, thinking of nothing but the good, unrestful weekend that is ahead.
