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sublingua | |||||
| The heart with a mind of its own.(Be present.) | The mind with a heart of its own.(It's past.) | The dream that is your waking life.(Go there now.) | |||
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The Demon of Christmas Past
Long day yesterday which followed a late night the night before: Sophistica arrived in town around 11:00pm and called, waking me up (I was doing one of those "I'm just going to lay down and read for a bit" naps until she got in). We had to do a bit of shopping as she arrived sans hair-care products and this meant a trip to the local 24-hour Walgreens for some conditioner and some leave-in conditioner. (It's hell being a girl sometimes, yeah?) In the store, we wandered around a bit, running into (but mostly trying to avoid) this man who seemed at first to be talking to himself in some sort of personalized language--that is, one of those running monologues that often sounds like quotations from the Book of Revelations delivered in a vague but insistant Spanglish. But, no, it turns out that he was talking in earnest to his companion, a woman in the next aisle. (I often do this to Max, to the dismay of other shoppers, so I thought it kind of funny to see someone else doing it--and in another language no less, which is a great improvement on the system, so I'm only sorry I didn't think of it myself.) Sophistica had told me about this disgusting-sounding bottled drink, "Alize," which she claims all the coolest hip-hop superstars drink in all their videos or something, and which she, now living in the hip-hop capital of the world (Madison, Wisconsin, of course), had tried at some party. Anyway, that meant that we had to wander over into the liquor department to check out the various flavors of this stuff--mixtures of cognac (?) and fruit juices like passion fruit or guava or some such junk. (And I realize how old I'm sounding that this particular drink doesn't appeal to me in the least, because fifteen years ago I was all about the strawberry-flavored Boone's Farm wine--drunk straight out of the bottle while sitting in some illegally entered (we climbed the fence at someone or other's apartment complex)hot tub no less.) But the real point of this overindulgent little story was that Soph and I walked into the liquor department at, like, one minute 'til midnight and almost gave the boy who was working behind the counter a minor heart attack. "You only have about thirty seconds to make a purchase," he called to us in this worried, shrill voice, making Soph and I both laugh. After the Walgreens trip, we went over to x's apartment where Soph is staying, only to find him about a third of the way into a bottle of red wine and making a grilled cheese sandwich for an after-midnight snack. After he had the sandwich and a cigarette (one of mine, of course, the cheap bastid) and Soph a glass of wine, we went over to Village Inn for yet more food and coffee. Soph had toast and jam, I had fruit and red chile, x had crepes. We drank a couple of pots of coffee and x and I reminisced about the Thanksgiving road trip we took to Las Vegas and L.A. in '96. The waiter--a young guy with bad teeth who was trying way too hard at cynical--bummed a couple of cigarettes from me. Such is the nature of the 24-hour restaurant 'round about hour two. I went home and went to bed, slept through a 5am alarm, woke at 7 to a phone call from Max, woke again at 8:45 to a call from Soph, who was shopping and wanted a companion. She came and got me and we went off to get x and then to lunch (sushi and sake) and then for coffee. The Boy joined us for coffee ("You look great," he said to me, enthusiastically, which is yet another reason for me to love him) and we sat and chatted and laughed. I love these people my friends: I haven't laughed that much in a long time. The Boy told two Soph/The Boy-daddy stories that thrilled me: one about "The Church of What's Good for Me Now" and the other a beautifully connected meth-addict light-bulb/Diogenes candle allegory. Soph at one point had me about on the floor with "Mmmm, 32-cubic feet," and "Just enough to leave the light off," comments. (And that's not explaining the joke, of course, but you would have had to have been there, and they don't translate well anyway). I love the Soph/Boy dimer. Love me them as monomers, too. In less than 24 hours, they increased the quotes on the quote wall by one each: Soph quoting from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, "Sometimes you play to lose," and The Boy's astute, "I'm not a jerk, I'm a 'Budhist.'" (That brings Soph's total on the wall up to three-- which is only rivalled by Shakespeare actually--"As Paul would say, 'Do the experiment.'" and "Don't punch the tar baby, Sublingua." and the most recent.) We drove around after that looking for a specific liquor store, didn't find it, did a bit of shopping elsewhere, then finally went to a liquor store that we knew was open. I came home with nothing, x bought a bottle of sake and two bottles of sparkling pear cider (one of which we later shared), The Boy and Soph bought a bottle of brandy for their papa's x-mas. By the time we were finished, it was getting fairly late and The Boy had to leave us and head home. We went off to collect Max from my apartment, shared the cider while we looked at some photographs that I recently procured from the other location, and tried to decide where to go to dinner. We settled on the local Aryuvedic chai house. The restaurant is across the street from a church, and, as we walked past, I noticed that they were doing the ubiquitous staging of the nativity scene, complete with the baby Jesus as portrayed by the 40-watt lightbulb. There were about fifteen people standing around watching, a fact that made me feel kind of sad. I had spoken with Sophistica about wanting to attend a midnight mass, but upon reflection, decided that I wasn't ready for it. I'm not ready to go back to church, but just thinking about it has made me think also about what exactly I can and can't accept about my religion, what I can and can't accept into my own system of beliefs. And I suppose that's important, but it still didn't get my believing ass into a pew at midnight last night. So we had a fabulous, fabulous vegetarian Christmas Eve dinner and halwa dessert last night, x, Sophistica, Max and I. Then our group broke up, Max and I driving around listening to the Ozomatli CD Soph had given me for xmas, x heading off to see his mom and stepdad, Soph heading off to see her family. And it was perfect. It was a beautiful night and day and night. I love my friends.
More lies:
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