versions

"It takes two to make a thing go right. With famous books, the first time is already the second since we approach them already knowing them. The cautious common saying of “re-reading” classics turns out to be an innocent veracity. We are always somehow re-reading a classic because we have encountered some previous incarnation of it. A refraction - in other stories, texts, or versions. What are the many versions if not diverse perspectives of a moveable event if not a long experimental assortment of emissions and emphasizes? Just about everything has been photo-shopped. Precisely it is about what 5 people think that this reality consists of. How an incident happens reflects nothing about the incident itself but it must reflect something about the person involved in the happening and supplying the how. 5 people interpret an action and each interpretation is different because in the telling and in the retelling the people reveal not the action but themselves." Versions, 2010, Oliver Laric

it is too damn hot

It is 91 thousand damn degrees, I am sitting right next to my air conditioner. Right next to it. It is on the lowest temperature. On the highest damn speed. Ok. 64 degrees and it’s on turbo. What the fuck do I need to put this bitch on? Power Ranger? This is fucking unacceptable. I did not sign up for this. When I prayed during the winter months, I axed the lord to make it warm, I did not say, “Lord, Please bring the devil from hell and have him sit his ass crack on earth”, that’s not what I axed for. That is not what I requested. Okay. He need to heat the houses of the people who was begging for summer all damn winter and fall. All them mother fuckers that was making pictures and special little telegrams counting down the days til summer, ‘I can’t wait to be on the beach’ ,‘ ‘I can’t wait to enjoy myself and be in the sun’, well you put the damn sun in their living rooms and you make my damn living room snow. I can not do this. Okay. The lord need to delegate temperature and weather to someone else. Where the hell is Moses? Talk to Moses about this shit. Because the Lord is out of control. And I can not deal with this. I am not tropical. I am not a damn toucann. This is…, this is too goddamn much. I should, it should not be so goddamn hot that I’m up in here having dreams about being on fire. Everybody getting on my damn nerves. It’s so goddamn hot. Shit! Shit. Shit. Eveybody’s getting on my nerves. Everybody’s kids getting on my nerves. Theses niggers down stairs keep barbequing every damn day. Every damn day. Every day can not be a holiday. Every day can’t be a holiday. It’s not a celebration. Who the hells paying for this damn meat? Barbequing every goddamn day. For what? Shit! Oh, it’s hot! I’m gonna slit someone’s throat over this heat. I’m gonna lose my mind. I get it why people just start shooting during the summer. Don’t give me no firearms because I’m about to go the hell off . I do not do this. This is not what I do. I’m not..hell no…shit. No. whew. Jesus, be a rain drop or central air. Because I can not breathe.

streetcar

This is where the streetcar stops. Look. This is Blanche. Blanche is a teacher. She teaches boys. What does she teach the boys? See Blanche arrive. Oh, Oh, Oh. She is pretty. She is hot. She is sweating. See Blanche sweat. See, see how she sweats See Stanley. He is hot. Hot, not like Blanche. He makes Blanche sweat. He makes Stella sweat. Stella is Blanche’s sister. Stella is fat. Fat with a baby. They live together. Stanley, Stella and Blanche. It is small. It is noisy. They have no money. Where did all the money go? . “Bella Reve.” Says Stanley. “Bella Reve.” Cries Blanche. “Shhh” says Stella. See Stanley angry. See Stella sad. See Blanche cracking. Stanley is having a party. Blanche is very popular. She makes a new friend. His name is Mitch. Mitch is Stanley’s friend. Mitch lives with his mother. Blanche wants to be friends with Mitch. Mitch wants to be friends with Blanche. Stanley is mad. He throws a radio out the window. Is Stanley mad at the Radio? See Blanche run. See Blanche and Stella run. Run, Stella run. Stanley is crying, “Stella” He wants her to come. Come Stella come. See Stella come. See Stella come to Stanley. Blanche is hungry. She wants pizza. She orders a pizza. Boy arrives with pizza. Pizza boy makes her thirsty. Run, boy, run. Blanche is thirsty. See blanche drink. Drink, Blanche, drink. See Blanche hide. Hide from the light. See Mitch look. Mitch wants to see. To see Blanche. Blanche does not want Mitch to see. Blanche hears music. Music in her head. It is a polka. Can you say polka? She sees the lights of a carousel. She is spinning. Spinning round and round. She is crying. She is falling. Falling. Falling. There is a gunshot. The spinning stops. The music stops. Stanley lies. He tells lies about Blanche. Stanley calls Blanche a whore. Is Blanche a whore? Is she? Happy Birthday. It is Blanches birthday. Stanley gives her a present. It is a bus ticket. A bus ticket for a birthday present? She does not like her birthday present. Mitch is late. Mitch is very very late. Blanche is hot. Blanche is thirsty. See Blanche drink. Drink Blanche drink. Blanche is sad. See sad Blanche. Sad, sad Blanche. Mitch is Late. He is angry. Mitch shines a light in Blanche’s face. Mitch sees Blanche. “Fire. Fire. Fire.” Cries Blanche. Blanche is dancing. She has been invited to a party. Look. Look at Blanche. Stanley wants to look. Look at Blanche. He takes off her dress so he can see her better. Blanche is crying. “Bella Reve. Bella Reve. Bella Reve.” Stanley comforts Blanche. Comforts her with his body. His dirty sweaty body. Stanley is dirty. Dirty Stanley needs a bath. Blanche is packing her bags. She is going on a trip. She is going on a trip with Shep. That’s a strange name. Shep. Shep does not exist. He lives in Blanche’s mind. Like the polka. Why is she packing her bags? Where is she going? There is a knock at the door. It is a stranger. Mitch cries. Stella is sobbing. Sobbing is like crying. Only harder. Blanche leaves with the stranger. Stella is sobbing. Stanley is smiling. Stella is stuck. .

"I meet you. I remember you. Who are you? You're destroying me. You're good for me. How could I know this city was tailor-made for love? How could I know you fit my body like a glove? I like you. How unlikely. I like you. How slow all of a sudden. How sweet. You cannot know. You're destroying me. You're good for me. You're destroying me. You're good for me. I have time. Please, devour me. Deform me to the point of ugliness. Why not you? Why not you in this city and in this night, so like other cities and other nights you can hardly tell the difference? I beg of you." ― Marguerite Duras, Hiroshima mon amour

New York state of mind

"I used to feel very much at home in New York City. I wasn't born here, but I might as well have been: I belonged here. Several years ago, however, I began to be oppressed by a feeling that New York City had gone past me and that I didn't belong here anymore. At first, these feelings were vague and sporadic, but then gradually became more definite and quite frequent. I began to feel painfully out of place where ever I was. Then, one Saturday afternoon, while I was walking around the ruins of Washington Market, something happened to me that led me, step by step, out of my depression. A change took place in me. And that I what i want to tell about." - Joseph Mitchell

the art of gesture

day 1

"This was an adequate enough performance, as improvisations go. The only problem was that my enentire education, everything I had ever been told or had told myself, insisted that the production was never meant to be improvised: I was supposed to have a script, and had mislaid it. I was supposed to hear cues, and no longer did. I was meant to know the plot, but all I knew was what I saw: flash pictures in variable sequence, images with no "meaning" beyond their temporary arrangement, not a movie but a cuttingroom experience. In what would probably be the middle of my life I wanted still to believe in the narrative and in the narrative's intelligibility, but to know that one could change the sense with every cut was to begin to perceive the experience as rather more electrical than ethical."

- Joan Didion, The White Album