I am in so much
pain this morning. I like it, the pain.
I love it. I’d live for it. It is quite a complex truck load of pain. Starting with the crown of my head: there is a dull notion of a
headache. A half hearted headache that hasn’t yet matured. There are
steel clamps on my cheekbones they feel as though they are trying to jut through the skin of my face. Why should my face hurt? Too much smiling last night. I’m out of shape that way. Back to the pain! When I turn my neck there is a sound, not unlike
splintering wood. The back of my neck is glowing with stiffness. My shoulders are trying to roll out of their places. My forearms are panting. The pain in my hands spreads out from the centre of my palm to the fingers.The muscle beneath each of my breasts that lifts my arms is unhappy and, for every arm lifting request I give those muscles they respond slow with a deep groan and the time lag of an
over-worked waitress. My belly is
completely empty. Well it’s filed with
cigarette smoke, I think, but nothing else. My pelvis is especially painful. The blunt little bones that form the corners of my hip seem to bump into everything. My robe rests on them and it feels heavy, as I walk and as I pass through the door if one brushes the frame it murmurs dully and joins the
chorus of pain. The big mussels in my legs from the butt to the calf all have the same complaint. They don’t know if they want to constrict or relax. They try a little of each, alternately, without me asking or Irving permission as I sit. At last my feet like my neck have become
avant garde musical instruments capable of making a whole range of cracking and popping sounds.
Did I mention that I like this?
What caused all this? Well, last night Nick convinced me to go to this party. I had asked Nick over. I was mad with loneliness, just wanted to talk: we talked, and watched most of walkabout which is like 2001 without the space men. He said: "this guy at filmmakers is having a party, lets go." I was only half interested but when I got there there was a little hot room where they kept the music going. Six or Seven people were dancing like there was no tomorrow. I joined them. I love to dance. I hear music and it activates my body. I’m like those frauds that say they can channel the spirits of the dead, only I channel the spirit of music and I don’t think I’m a fraud. I got dancing and I couldn’t stop. The song would end and I try to walk off the floor, but then the next song would start and one part of my body would start tapping or shaking time and next thing I knew my body would have pulled me out there and the music could be running right though me like a hose that can’t help but wave and gyrate when the water’s shooting out. Nick danced too, less. I don’t think he had anything that he needed to dance out. When I was dancing I was trying to shake something off of me. I don’t know what it was. I might have succeeded. Even if I only half succeeded, it’s worth all the pain.