First Off

here's the first chapter from a new work in progress. i hope you enjoy it.

Time slows down the first time I see or hear anything great. I've learned to appreciate this. It gives me time to contemplate and revel in whatever it is I'm experiencing.

Many three-minute bursts of rock music have given me time to think, re-think, and over-think my relationship with rock n roll.

It took me a long time to find out that it works the same way for bad news.

I've never had a near-death experience, I've never seen my life flash before my eyes.

But I think I know how it works.

When the time seems to slow, my brain goes into overdrive. In a seizure inducing montage of images, sounds, ideas, and feelings, I falter and stumble.

It's not life, by any stretch. It's not sequential, even remotely so, it doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make enough sense to be a dream. It is completely ethereal and overwhelming.

If prone to motion sickness, it would induce vomiting. If prone to weeping, it would induce loud crying jags. If prone to hysterics, it would induce furious screaming. If prone to violence, it would induce broken bones. If prone to fainting, it would induce catatonia.

I am prone only to apathy. I just sit, stunned and stewing.

Suddenly, I know what clothes in the wash feel. Wash, rinse, spin.

In rare cases of bliss, I'm affected longer than the song lasts.

In every case of bad news, I am left reeling, as if having been on the recieving end of a left hook to the jaw. I can remain that way for hours, or days.

I spent a week battered and bruised before I got over being dumped for the first time, in high school.

I spent a full day delirious after losing the first job I gave a shit about.

I spent several hours sulking after recieving my first rejection letter, from the University of California at Berkeley.

I never thought it could last a year.

posted by Ian Quinn  : 8/05/2002 04:13:00 AM