jundanu

Who needs working out when just getting around in the Albayzin requires a strong constitution and tough but comfortable shoes. I overheard a young Spanish woman cry out as she stumbled down our rocky street in high heeled fashion boots: “why didn’t we stay in Barcelona?!

Mike Pence, Mr Vice President, please tell us, what is God’s plan? Why, Mike, did He create us in His image, and then set us down on this little blue ball situated at the back end of an insignificant galaxy surrounded by unimaginable, howlingly empty space? What was God thinking when a fat, pig-eyed monster calmly shot infants in the head: in His own house? What was the great plan there, Mike? And what lies behind your seemingly permanent tight smile and carefully maintained Republican haircut? Mike? Mike? Earth to Mike?

I actually live in this delightful little apartment complex surrounded by walls. The WiFi sucks, but everything else is comfortable and quiet. The tiled floors here remind me of something out of Oz: the not quite yellow brick road.

The restaurant El Mirador is chockablock right next to the world famous Bar Kiki, recently profiled in the New York Times. El Mirador proudly proclaims that it has been serving Andalucians since 1982, which in Spanish terms is about five seconds ago.

One thing I do not like in Spain is trying to shop. If you don’t get most of your errands done by 2PM, you might as well wait till the next day. While restaurants and bars remain open, most stores close for two or three hour siesta. Not great for late sleepers like me.

His cell kept buzzing all through the meeting. During the fifteen minute break, he stepped into the hallway and checked his message log. It showed five messages, all but one the same number from someplace called Indian Head, Montana, the last from his wife. The first message lasted only a few seconds: he heard noises in the background, someone yelling, a high-pitched whistle and a fumbling sound, like someone struggling with a pay phone, then the beep ending the call. He took a sip from his cup of cold coffee and played the second one. This one lasted about a minute: the background of voices, some laughing, and that high-pitched whistle, but this time he could make out the caller speaking in a very low voice, as if he were not talking directly into the phone. He heard what he thought were the words, “you” and “must” and something like “release”, or maybe “please.” The rest was too garbled to understand.

He noticed that his hand holding the phone was trembling slightly, but it often did when he didn’t get enough sleep and then drank too much coffee. He decided to listen to the rest of the messages later and returned to the conference room. The meeting droned on for another hour, during which his phone did not buzz. He had 90 minutes to have lunch before the meeting resumed, so he left the building and hurried over to the corner snack bar across the street in time to get his favorite seat on the right corner of the counter. Ordering his usual cheddar cheese omelet with hash browns, he could hear his stomach growling with anticipation. Congratulating himself on ordering tea instead of coffee, he pulled out his phone and listened to the third message. At first all he could hear was ambient noises, footsteps, some animal howling, then closer, two voices talking, one low and raspy, the other higher and perhaps female. The low voice: “He don’t know…; the higher one: “He does…I [garbled] something…afraid…” The message ended abruptly here. His omelet and tea having arrived, he put down his phone and dug in, but for some reason, his appetite had disappeared and he chewed and swallowed without pleasure.

Sipping his tea, which tasted to him like the not too clean hot water it mostly was, he pressed the button for the fourth message, his mild curiosity now merging with anxiety. The high-pitched whistle was now joined by drumming. The whistling and drumming abruptly stopped, followed by almost complete silence, except for the wind. Then the woman’s voice said: “listen.” A clattering sound as the phone on the other end was placed down, then many voices chanting, a horn bleating, a roaring like rushing water. The phone grew hot against his ear. Something passed through the receiver and seemed to lodge in his ear. His hand became numb and he dropped the phone, which clattered to the ground. A few customers were now staring over at him. When he tried to bend down to pick up the phone, a wave of dizziness washed over him and he had to straighten up a again. A bitter taste filled his mouth and he found it difficult to swallow or breathe. Then the restaurant started to spin, first slowly, then faster until he saw the ceiling fall away to reveal black night. A searing pain shot up his left arm and clutched at his chest. The last thing he saw was a hand in a red glove reach out for him.

*

As the body was being wheeled out to the ambulance, Rick picked up the phone and saw a message flashing. Shrugging and looking around, he clicked the button and put it to his ear. A woman’s voice said: “Honey, call me. I received a package from some place in Montana. It has your last name on it but a different first one: Steven instead of your Stephen, as usual. It’s also got a funny smell and I want to take it back to the post office. Let me know if you were expecting something like this…love you, bye!” Rick handed the phone to the EMP who was glaring at him and sat down to finish his tuna salad sandwich.

In the sixteenth century, a Spanish monk published a horrifying eye-witness account of atrocities committed against Native Americans by the Conquistadores. Recently, the slaughter of 59 people was called “the greatest mass murder in American History. Which is true if you forget the murder of 250 old men, women and children at Wounded Knee. And nearly that many by  Custer’s Seventh Cavalry at the Washita River. Those who forget history are condemned to repeat it, and repeat it, and repeat it.

Look out the window. Do you see the brick wall opposite? Of course you do. Now, concentrate on just one brick, any one will do. Now, imagine that the brick you have chosen is all of reality. Try to eliminate all the other bricks. Got it? Good, now try to imagine just one little point in that brick, perhaps where there is the slightest irregularity. Now, close your eyes and concentrate on that one point, which has become all that exists, including you. Now comes the hard part. Try to erase that point with your mind. How do you feel? Maybe just a little uneasy, maybe just a little afraid? You can’t erase that point, can you, because that would mean erasing your own consciousness, which is impossible. Now, open your eyes, take a breath, and accept that we are all locked permanently in the prison of our minds. What lies beyond that prison? Nothing? Maybe…or…

Life is often disappointing. Love fails, friends die, dreams come to nothing. And yet, the older I get, the more amazed and thankful I become that I have received the great gift of existing. Science teaches us that the mathematical chance of sentient life developing on earth, or any other planet, is stunningly small. Come to think of it, why does anything exist, rather than nothing at all?

Hi! It’s Shiva and the Putti here to beg you to join this guy’s site at jundanu.wordpress.com so he’ll release us from our present frozen state. He swears that you will probably not regret it.