MIXED EPISODE

  She sits amidst crowded pews, listening to the closing doors and bells of departure.  She is compelled to run away.  They're out to get her.  She hasn't slept or eaten in four days.  She has to run away from the enemies and get far from the people she cares about to spare them from her madness…

She is walking on the fringes of society armed with everything she owns.  To her horror, she's become a bag lady talking to herself.  She has to keep moving.  They might get her if she sits down for a while.  So she walks up and down strange neighborhoods at four in the morning looking at each house wishing to be able to come inside and take a shower and get something to eat.  She doesn't know how long it's been.

Finally the sun comes up.  As she is walking on the sidewalk picking flowers from people’s front lawns and putting them in her basket, she comes upon a yard where a brindle pit bull comes running straight at her behind a gateless fence barking ferociously at her.  There was a sign that said 'Beware of Elvis.'  She puts her items down and begins talking to Elvis and he stops barking at her.  He starts wagging his tail and smiles at her.  Animals love her. The owner comes up to the fence and introduces himself to her.  He's been watching her the minute she turned the corner onto his block and was smitten with her immediately.  He invites her to the back where he was doing some stone work.  She quickly obliges.  It's not every day someone invites her in, especially in her condition.

She talks non-stop without pause about where she's been and how she has to get away from 'them.'  He thinks she is quick-witted and funny, nonetheless, so he invites her inside to take a shower.  She doesn't hesitate and takes a one-hour shower.  She sings the national anthem over and over.  She remembers the time the graveyard shift nurses had to literally drag her out of the shower at four in the morning.  The shower is the only place where her thoughts slow down.

He knew she was starving so he packs her up in his truck with Elvis and went out for pizza.  As they are waiting in the truck for the pizza, the guy, Dave, lights up a joint and passes it to her.  She takes it and inhales deeply from it.  She never refuses drugs from anybody.  So they get back and he takes her to the basement.  She sees this massive fish tank with the brightest colored fish she had never seen before. Adam and Eve clown fish and this mesmerizing, squiggly organism called an anemone, where they frolic,  electric Hendrix-blue flat fishes, snouted cadmium yellow light-hued fish, that Japanese poison fish, a fish that looks like a Faberge  egg, and some multi-legged fire engine-red, praying mantis-looking shrimp. Even the rock formations’ architecture makes the tank look like Reissa on Star Trek Next Generation. It all looks too marvelous to be real.  She can't get over how beautiful it looks.  She could stare at it all night.  He had a hard time tearing her away from it so she could eat.

    

Dave puts in a CD, The Dark Side of the Moon.  The haunting slow-motion heartbeat that starts the album makes her feel like her throat is being strummed like a double upright bass.  On The Run (which she is too) becomes three-dimensional, as though she's having an out of body experience.  She feels like she fell through the rabbit hole and toppled into to some kind of Amazon Airport Wonderland.  Time comes on and it gets out of control with an explosion of bells and sirens. Then Great Gig comes on and she has her fifth epiphany of the night and realizes that apart from becoming color and music, her afterlife will be one big everlasting orgasm just like the climax of this album, but for eternity.  It just keeps getting better.  

Everything is fluid, constantly changing like amoebas.  The guy's face changes into ten different people like a shape-shifter.  His name must be Legion.  Everything in the room becomes fascinating to her.  She sees a vase and doesn't know what it is because she's never seen a vase before.  There's so much stimulation. Then for an eternal nanosecond there is a moment of mental acuity when you just know WHY.   On the far wall, she notices a tank with a viridian-hued iguana in it, the kind they have at-large in Aruba by the pool.  It tells her All is as it should be. Just outside the screen there is another tank with three huge turtles stacked one on top of the other singing Mr. Sandman.  Then all of a sudden she hears quacking in the backyard.  It's a duck.   It really is.  It's a white duck and his name is Quack.  There's a pond back there, but the duck is strolling around the grounds until it feels at home and here's to you, Mrs. Robinson. Jesus loves you more than you will know...wo wo wo.)  Damn that song...The duck is waddling around the yard  in the middle of the night quacking at the moon.  This is too much.  What is this place? Who is this guy?  What's going on?

   She even has a conversation with Elvis, who, by the way, is very funny.  He tells dirty jokes and does imitations of James Bond.  It turns out, the guy, Dave, is thirty and is single and is lonely, according to Elvis.  That's only five years older than herself.

So this goes on, smoking a joint with this nice guy, Dave, who informs her that she is smoking Purple Haze.  Her favorite color!  This is definitely a sign.  It means  they can't get at her through this looking glass.  Her head feels as light as a feather, swaying in the wind like a kite in the Azores.  Their voices sound like echoes in Narcissus' forest and their movements have colorful fuzzy trails. And with purple in it!  There is a bulb on the ceiling that has lightning in it with different colors.  All this place  is colors and music.  Just like her orgasmic afterlife will be like.  She feels like she's Alice in the Caterpillar's garden of delights and with every species of fauna.

 She starts to undress until she is completely naked.  She has no concept of modesty.  Her world has no mores.   She is dancing now, like a snake charmer, and Elvis is panting and drooling, as he enjoys her performance.  The guy, Dave, is watching her with a pleased smile on his face. He likes seeing her shapely body undulating to the music.  She feels a strong sense of deja vu, like she's been here before.  She tells herself it must be remnants of another lifetime; she knows she's heard this music before but doesn't know where. To her,  it narrates the story of her life.

She keeps him up all night, but that's okay because it's the weekend and he doesn't have to go to work the next day.  This guy is so nice to her, she feels like she should have sex with him.  That's just how it goes.  He did give her drugs after all.  So she begins to undo his pants but he puts her hands aside and tells her he just wants to hang out with her. He is amused by her and likes watching her enjoy herself.  She is immensely relieved.  He tells her he wants her to stay.  That's fine with her because she's tired of constantly moving.  It does get lonely at four in the morning. She doesn't ever want this to end but they can only take her in small doses. Then they make her leave.  She understands.  They can't handle her.  The guy, Dave, though, gives off a reassuring vibe.  She begins taking her items out of her bags and begins bower-birding; putting her little tshatshkis and paintings all around the room. Brings out her magic purple candle and lights it.  He’s intrigued by her ritual.  He's been entranced by her the minute he saw her picking flowers and putting them in her basket.

Then out of nowhere she starts having a tantrum, screaming and yelling at him, accusing him of being one of them and putting her away, saying hurtful things to him.  The smallest things can tick her off.  She doesn’t even know why she’s so upset.  Usually at this point, they throw her out.  But this Dave, sets her on the counter and lets her pound his chest, allowing her to vent her rage until she calms down and starts crying uncontrollably.  He carries her to the couch and Elvis comes up to her and starts licking her all over, tickling her. She is instantly pacified.  She didn't think a pit bull could be so amiable.  She bursts out laughing so hard she can't stop.  Her abs are excruciating but it makes her laugh even harder, like when you don't want them to stop even when it hurts.  That high comes back and she is experiencing her solipsistic euphoria.  It feels so good it's indescribable.  It beats an orgasm all day long.

The guy, Dave, knows exactly what her story is.  He recognized it right away, so he understands what he is getting himself into.  He goes upstairs and comes back with an easel and paint and paper.  She is thrilled because these days she only gets to paint in the madhouse, her home away from home. He knows she is a creative person.  He could tell by her paintings.  They usually are.  He puts on one of her CDs.  It's 1910 Fruitgum Company.  That's all she likes to listen to.  He sees that she is in her element, painting naked and dancing to her music.  The guy, Dave, feels like his little realm is complete.  He enjoys watching the girl ride her wave.  Good thing he told Elvis to sic her just so he could meet her.

He lights up a joint and passes it to her.