fuck the state

The Red Son costume is finally complete – authentic ushanka hat with Soviet emblem, hand-drawn Commie Superman t-shirt, weathered gray worker's cape, hammer & sickle belt buckle, and gray pants tucked into high leather work boots. The party is for D.C. political types, mostly Libertarians. I am Red Son, Proletarian Superhuman, and I fear nothing. “Stalin?” people ask incredulously, gawking at me as Obama Robbin' Hood or Spiderman, American Revolutionary or Roaring Twenties flapper. A doe-eyed woman in tight dress and fake-fur coonskin cap says she will go home with me if I make good on my threat to PETA her ass with a gallon of blood. Later, I watch her reluctantly let a man kiss her on the mouth. I am a Proletarian Superhuman; my heart is pure. The inside of the house on the quiet residential street is lit by black-light, and someone has used black-light sensitive tape to write Fuck The State over a prominently-placed Gadsden flag. We chant this slogan while dancing to techno beats, our bodies gyrating wildly as our hearts swell with thoughts of Freedom. I find a flashlight in the grass out back and return it to the mercenary types guarding the front gate, who assure me that their semi-automatic rifles are fakes spray-painted black to look real. I am faster than a speeding bullet; I fear nothing. Next to the backyard bar, near the fire-circle, someone has placed a pumpkin engraved with a hyper-accurate likeness of Lindsey Graham. Our ardor is high, our spirits flicker, aroused. “Have you heard about the revolution?” a man dressed as Trotsky keeps yelling from his post by the kegs of beer. For a spell, he and I harangue all passersby, speaking vehemently of revolution and demanding that our voices be heard. I am a Proletarian Superhuman, and I would like to speak to you about something important. I make a game of pretending to mistake both guys dressed as Where's Waldo for lighthouses – they are gracious and laugh with me; they refuse to be offended. A sexy border patrol agent and I briefly suck face, with me grabbing her mammoth breasts through her shirt, but she is a smoker and I am repulsed by the taste of her mouth. The night deepens; a neighbor calls the cops. “I wish we could smoke some more weed,” a man in a strap-on Amish chin-beard says while inhaling candy from a table over by the kegs. I a Kal-L, chocoholic. Tell me: Do you have a moment to speak about the revolution?

© americanifesto / 場黑麥

symbols of Athena, from DC to NYC

 (Herald Square)

(Herald Square)

(Arlington Cemetery)

some of my America 2012

one small thing

It was but one small thing, one simple step not taken, that caused the big battery to drain. It started with d-cell batteries, themselves a few decades old, that I was trying to charge for the first time in their lives, so as to use them in a lamp, for reading; the d-cells, even after sitting in the charger for nine hours, had not retained any charge, providing not even trace illumination. Conceding defeat, I had dutifully unplugged the charger from the extension cord that runs to the 750-watt inverter in the basement, which is connected via alligator clamps to the big battery, a 12 volt deep-cycle marine type.

The reason that the marine deep-cycle exhibited a diminished charge compared to if it had simply sat there not providing power to anything was that I had forgotten to turn off the inverter when done using it; therefore, the little green LED light that burns when the inverter is turned on had slowly whittled away at the big battery's charge, over twelve hours chewing up a couple of amperes. One small thing overlooked, one simple step not taken, had impacted demonstrably, using up less electricity than I had originally feared, however, for after turning off the DC-to-AC inverter, the big battery's charge jumped back up almost all the way back to where it would have been had I not been such a fool. Had it not been for the post-booze haze which moved in Saturday morning and hung on tenaciously all day, I might have remembered to depress that one small button, thus saving myself a bit of consternation, but, ah well, the past cannot be changed, while the future is pregnant with smarter decisions, better made. Huzzah.

And so, I shall hazard to declare, it goes with many things in life – the small and easily-overlooked, if they are indeed viewed as small, if indeed they are overlooked, quickly turn into things of tremendous import, wreaking havoc if allowed to grow from tiny saplings into towering trees. It is for me, then, to remember to attend to the small beginnings of things, and to stay with them, patiently, until they have reached their natural end. In this fashion, then, I might actually make something of this pathetic life of mine. Mahalo.

場黑麥 mentiri manufactorem fecit