"CHOICES" Chapter II

Welcome Visitor. I hope you have enjoyed my story so far. Here, as promised is Chapter II


II Jason


Some people feel as though they have never been nor can ever be part of the drama that is life.They must view it as from behind thick and smokey glass; always on the outside looking in, never quite sure what they’re seeing. Jason Dante was such a person, possessing a thoroughly artistic soul but one imprisoned in the entirely non-dexterous body of a blue ribbon klutz. He had the spirit of Leonardo and the hands of Quasimodo. He couldn’t touch anything without first touching someone not similarly afflicted. As a result, it was a sad, depressed and somewhat gloomy person who sat at a cluttered kitchen table, with hot tea ( never coffee ) to compose a pointed and not altogether spontaneous letter to his long absent girlfriend, lover, companion and , yes, meal ticket. Before beginning he glanced about the tiny apartment which was home to his tiny life. His latest work of fiction, all five pages, sat crumpled and discarded on the living room couch like the mocking bit of failure that it was. He looked at it and wondered why he had been treated with such indifference by all the Muses. Indifference! He had not been abandoned, discarded, deserted or even hated by the Muses. No, just ignored. He couldn’t pray to one, invoke or beg one. Indifference, he knew, was the worst thing. Worse even than being intensely hated. Being hated requires, at least, that one’s existence be acknowledged. Why would God, or whatever, give him the desire to create but leave him as bereft of talent as a tree is absent of leaves in the winter? Life, he thought, was simply not understandable. It clearly had no meaning or purpose beyond, perhaps, the torture of poor souls such as himself.

Leaving self pity behind for the moment, jason thought of Tayresa and began to write:




July 12, 2041

Dear Tay,

As you might imagine San Francisco is in full bloom now. Life is popping up ( just like burnt toast in a skid row diner ) everywhere, in every way. There are people on the streets today who were virtually at death’s door six weeks ago. Funny what a little light and warmth can do for the human spirit. It is now difficult to escape the BART without catching the eye of an eager stranger intent on dragging someone into a heavy duty discussion of some weighty thing. You know, like the death of God or the right of personal freedom in a crime and terror infested world. Of course if one is civilized (and aren’t we both?) one must appear interested and say something provocative so the poor fellow can feel as though he has been “truly alive” on that day. But poor me, try as I may, I can not dredge up enough love of my fellow man to care much for the Frisco awakening. Again, it’s all that light and warmth. We desperately need a few clouds to restore a proper measure of gloom and solitude. I enjoyed the solitude of the winter and wish for it now more and more because you are not here. My own human spirit has been grounded since you left. The sun may have risen for San Francisco but not for me. I cannot escape the shadow of your absence. Were you here I too would welcome the light and warmth. I would embrace all those heavy conversations with the passion of a true believer. I would do it just to hear words tumble from your sweet mouth and have them fall upon me like cool and soothing rain . Why are you not here? Don’t you love me enough? Am I not important? Surely you know that in the history of Me the moments that have just passed have passed forever. None may return, none may be relived. All belong now to the ages. Do I sound pitiful enough? Have I touched your heart? More importantly, have I made you feel guilty? Good. I suppose I should feel some pity for you, stuck as you are in New York in that awful play. How do you do it every night? It’s of little value, love, give it up and come home. I will not blossom without you and God knows I need to flower. Enough? OK, how about some news then?

Speaking of sun light, the Greenies were in town this past weekend. You know what a joke they have always been, well I think they have gotten past that and are now a genuine pain in the ass if not a very real threat. I attended one of their rallies on Saturday and went home frightened. They have become a Saturday afternoon B grade movie monster, only the footage doesn’t stop and no one says The End. Expecting a good laugh to pull me out of my funk, I got, instead, a chill that has yet to leave me. Really Tay, they are scary.

I didn’t know there were as many of them as there apparently are. Certainly I didn’t know Frisco was home to so many. Then, you can’t really tell a Greenie from anyone else unless you look very closely. When you do you notice a slightly greenish tint to their skin. In fact, in that regard, they look sickly. Speak to one and you are likely to walk away feeling you have encountered a genuine dullard. Not stupid, mind you, just dull, boorish, uninteresting and bland. A person you would rather not be around for fear that ever after life world have the taste and feel of cardboard and paper glue. That is the initial impression. It doesn’t last long. It vanishes like summer snow once you have seen and heard Edward.

Edward, what a poor choice of names for this guy. Ice cream vendors are named Edward. School teachers, librarians, shoe salesman and insurance brokers are all Edwards. All wandering about in silent crowds, perfectly invisible and totally forgotten at the end of the day. Hell, he might just as well have been named Bruce! Sure we could talk about the old “ what’s in a name, a rose by any other name would smell......etc.” but is it just an accident that other conquerers, bringers of change and smartly dressed leader types (make no mistake, that is what he wants to be) have had names like Attila, Caesar, Alexander, Gengis and Moses? You know, it would be difficult to look those guys in the eye. The sound, alone, of those names makes a person jump and salute or cower in the corner. On the other hand, the sound Edward makes most often prompts one to waive a hand at a passing figure and ask for another quiche. Shakespeare (now there’s a name), as you know, has Cassius ask Brutus this very question but his argument is not very convincing and in the end is of no avail. No, Brutus could never have uttered “Veni, Vedi, Veci”. It took a Caesar to do that. Might there be a god somewhere who properly assigns the right name to the right person? If there is he has a strange sense of humor these days. Well it doesn’t matter, Edward is here and about to take center stage. I think the world will listen to him.

You know me, I usually walk around Golden Gate park hoping some bit of life will reach out and force me into usefulness. This time though I intentionally ( with real purpose ! ) went in search of Edward and his Greenies. I wanted to hear him speak.Actually I felt strangely compelled to hear him. Oh God help me. Surely I ‘m not a party to some weird cosmic connection. Not that I’m opposed to cosmic connections mind you. At least not in general. I wouldn’t mind being connected with something promethean like the farthest quasars, the black hole at the center of the Milkyway galaxy or the initial Big Bang process for the creation of elemental hydrogen; but with a fat green little man who would just as soon be a dandelion? I couldn’t handle that. It would be a new low for me. For Me! For the man to whom the bottom of a crushed coke can at the bottom of a dumpster at the lowest point in Death Valley is UP! Some creatures get to be angels, some don’t. Where is the justice?

Before I begin to sound too pitiful, suffice it to say I eventually found the spot where the Greenies were setting up a small stage for Edward to stand upon and address his faithful. The stage had a podium in the center and a huge banner at the back. The banner was done with large green letters on a white background and read, “ Back to the beginning, to the time before terror, to the time of sanity and stand alone life. “ By the time I arrived a large crowd had already assembled. Most of them were Greenies who had seated themselves on the ground without blankets or any other picnic like accouterments. These folks weren’t there for fun and games. I then witnessed the most bizarre scene as some of them began to ‘feed.’ I suppose as the need hit them, various Greenies, in no particular place or discernible pattern, would suddenly stretch out on the grass and begin to roll about. As they did so their bodies ( didn’t I tell you, they striped their clothes off first? ) shone with the most vivid green. This ‘feeding’ would last five minutes or so after which each of them eagerly sought out one of the many vendors in attendance who sold them large bottles of water which they immediately gulped down, to the last drop, on the spot. While they were feeding, the Greenies appeared to be utterly impervious to anything and everything around them. To say they were in a stupor would simply not tell the tale. They were in something quite apart from and beyond that. I found it disturbing, chilling, unhuman. Perhaps they had been temporarily shuffled off to some vegetable Nirvana. Who knows? I do know this though, I don’t wish to witness it again.

As I watched and waited for Edward, I felt a creeping sense of unease as those around me seemed less and less like fellow creatures and more and more like alien beings. Aliens for whom I felt no kinship, no affinity, no connection. Of course being the rational person ( as you know ) that I am, I walked up to a man standing near me and looked directly into his eyes. No, he did not have scary shark eyes, soulless and dead. I saw a spark there, a definable essence. I peered through those windows of his and glimpsed a terror. I would have preferred the shark eyes. I can understand sharks. I can even pity them their savage existence and, so, fear them less. What looked back at me from behind those eyes was not human and not something I could understand. Fear began to grow in me. It continues to do so.

I decided to leave; to return to my small apartment and continue missing you when the everyday all around us sounds suddenly ceased. A quiet, like nothing I’ve experienced, descended and enveloped us all. As if by a single command, I and all the Greenies turned to focus on the assembled stage. Edward was coming. I could sense it. We all could. A small murmuring began; barely perceptible at first but growing steadily, becoming, at last, a great sound of prayerlike exultation. “ Edward, Edward, they chanted, welcome Son of the Sun and Father.” I stared unashamedly and noticeably, frightened to the core but too fascinated to leave. There he was, Edward, the first Greenie, struggling mightily to carry his great bulk to the dais and podium. I couldn’t move; I needed to hear him speak.

“ Do not fear your gift, he began, “ grasp it, sense it, feel it, experience it, revel in it and give thanks for it. You are the true children of the Creator, His Holy Chosen Ones. Do not believe the lies you hear all about you. Creation was not set in motion only to fall prey to the second law of thermal dynamics. The Creator’s plan was to bless his children with ever increasing amounts of energy; energy needed for the continuing creation and imminent Salvation. In His great plan first will come awareness, then experience, then knowledge, then wisdom, then truth followed by the Blessed Reuniting. But only when His children can participate in His divine love. A love which will smash this universe and begin the timeless Kingdom of Infinity. So it was meant to be. But, Blessed Ones, a demon has crept into the Garden and has fashioned Man in his own perverted image. He has made of him a beast who must murder and consume the flesh of his fellow creatures simply to maintain existence in a darkness of misunderstanding, where he remains hopelessly lost. Now the Creator has been moved to action. He has chosen you,His true children. He has declared a Holy War to restore stand alone life and sanity to His creation. His pain calls upon us to stop the murder and other foul deeds of omnivorous mankind, with a Holy Crusade. We are, all of us, His warriors, His champions. Follow me to the shining truth of photosynthetic life. Help me deliver this Earth from evil and return it to the Creator, pure and sanctified. Do not shrink from this task. It is not a duty but a joy! Blessed be the Green, Blessed be the Light, Blessed be the Sugar and the nonviolent life. Blessed be the serum I have given you and Blessed be those who have been chosen to accept it. Follow me now. Salvation is at hand.’” Edward continued this ranting for an hour or so, saying many things of a similar ilk but you get the idea. When he had finished, he waddled to a small table where he eagerly emptied a large bottle of water. For a short moment I didn’t notice Edward’s obesity and remarkably ugly countenance, so taken was I by his call to Holy Arms. Eventually, however, my natural abhorrence of all things groupie shocked me back to reality. I was stunned, then angry, then giddy with bemused laughter but, finally, as I have said, simply frightened.

Edward, love , is a cartoon. A real looney tune, emphasis on looney. And my God the way he thinks! What a photosynthetic rush to judgment. What a nightmarish scene from the Grand Gingnol. All of us straight and evil humans being vigorously pursued by a wavering and easily blown about army of multicolored pansies root toot tooting at us with vine like AR-15’s and shouting, in beautiful and harmonious tones, indignant homilies of righteous anger.

Tay, I hope I can still laugh about this in the coming weeks. Please come home. I need to hold your hand.
Love, Jason




To Be Continued













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