HOTEL

On the cusp of homelessness once again, I am currently domiciled at the last vacancy of this hotel where I have yet to be thrown out like I always am.  Kean University is using it as a dorm.  There are voices on the outside of the walls.  I doubt it's the students because it sounds so menacing.  Maybe it is them.  They sound like they are getting closer, approaching my door.  Are they trying to get in?  Is that the doorknob turning?  I cover my mouth, gasping, and crouch down between the two beds, rocking back and forth.  I take the clock radio and set it on the floor next to me.  I turn up the volume to drown out the noises.  Pink Floyd is singing 'Mother.'  This is the first time I'm hearing this song.  It's pretty.  It's soothing, but then the DJ interrupts and says 'They're coming,'.....'mother I didn't mean to be so high.' It's not my fault.

I had taken the all the necessary precautions when I first got here.  I put Mike's tee-shirt, the one with the face of a white wolf on it (it protects me) and put it over the TV.  Everyone knows they are watching you through these things.  I put towels over the lamp shades because, naturally, there are cameras in them.  They are strategically placed.  I draw the shades.  It gets so dark sometimes so I light my honeysuckle candle.  I even put cardboard over the vent in the bathroom. It sucks it right up.  I don't even have to tape it.  There are listening devices in there.

Where was I?  Oh, yes.  My heart is pounding.  I can't breathe.  What do they want from me?  They're stampeding up and down the hallway.  I feel my heart beating through my eardrums.  If I run, they'll catch me and dismember me like they did to V in that Pynchon novel.  They'll most likely put me away like they all do.  Actually, it wasn't that bad the last time because they didn't restrain me or mummify me on a stretcher.  And I only got harpooned once.

Where was I?  Oh, yes. 'Hotel California' is  on the radio telling me i can check out but i can never leave.  It's telling me I'll always be trapped in my own mind, in chaos.  I have a personal DJ on a different airwave that plays music for me.  Sometimes a song will come on that I was just thinking of.  I need to have music on non-stop.  And if I'm not around music, I'll sing non-stop.  I'll even sing to people on the street or the Staten Island Ferry.  Music speaks to me.  Sometimes it tells me what to do.

Where was I?  Oh, yes.  I always get lost in my thoughts.  I'm three thoughts ahead of myself and everyone else.  I can't stop talking because there's so much to get out. I have three conversations with any one person at the same time.  I can speak at the same time they do and have another conversation with myself and still be involved in theirs.  They get so pissed off.  They can't keep up.  Well, that's not my problem.  They call it racing thoughts. It actually hurts sometimes.  However, it comes in handy when you're in an altercation with someone that hasn't escalated.  You're two steps ahead of them, it's like you can read their mind, so you can shut them up in a second.  You're quick and say whatever's in your head without filter.  It feels so good to not give a s**t and say whatever you want.  Some people can't handle the truth.  I like to rub it in their face.  However, I do have boundaries.  There are just some lines you don't cross with certain select people.  In the end they can't handle me after all, so I just walk away and not have a tantrum.  I learned my lesson the first couple times.  I can't say I blame them.  But they came to me.  Oh, well, at least I was there to bring out their inner rockstar.  Don't ask.

Where was I?  Oh, yes.  I am looking at the walls that are plastered with my paintings, clippings, playbills, collages, etc.  The room gets so cluttered sometimes.  There's this one painting I did with R. and I see it for the first time with terror.  Everything on the walls are moving, swaying like those mirages in the desert.  The painting is of a man kneeling behind a woman on her elbows.  I thought I was painting circles, but it ended up being the round table at the foot of the bed.  We painted it together and I didn't see what we were painting until I see it now.  I am convinced that it's possessed.  It's R.  He's watching me too.  He's coming back to kill me.  He knows what room I'm in.  I decide to call the cops.  They come and ask me the usual questions; my name-address-birthdate-today-month-year-president.  I know the answers in order by rote.  Sometimes that gets you out of being hauled to the madhouse.  Sometimes.

Where was I?  Oh, yes.  I'm in a hospital somewhere in Passaic or Clifton.  I am in a small room and my right wrist is handcuffed to the bed rail.  I hear a man yelling obscenities.  I hear another man singing 'Amazing Grace.'  The nurses come in and I start flipping out.  I am kicking and screaming violently.  As usual, the big black guys come in and hold me down while I get the harpoon.  Again.