What had happened to us in Austin? Stuffed like sardines into tin-can rooftop pools. Laughing at the overemotional women of sin. 105 degrees of heat. I overhear someone saying “Its hotter on the roof because we’re closer to the equator.” I disregard it into some sort of frozen sweet-tea margarita.
My night in El Paso had been without much incident. Wandering the streets close to the freeway where plastic bags served as eerie incandescent leaves on bushes and cacti alike. Never discriminating. Running my hand across the border fence into Mexico where it reminds me of recess schoolyard fights. A Mariachi band that goes on at midnight drowns out the song I’m writing in my head. I sleep riddled with coughs so punctual they double as an alarm clock. I have a rash on my arm, it itches and worries me. I wake up on time because of both.
Billy and Mark pick me up from the Austin airport. I can already tell this is gonna be as good as bad news gets. We grab Corey from Steve’s house and head straight for the one thing Austin knows best besides BBQ and skinny chicks. Cheap Tex Mex and beers. Summer and Murph come to join us and I can see the shit-show in their eyes. Gonna have to cut dead weight before too long. Alliances will have to be destroyed then mended down the line. Future trips for peacekeeping missions.
No exact details can quite be discerned from this weekend. A small checklist of debauchery that allowed for ample room to survive. Best-case scenarios were achieved. We allowed each other the room to maneuver when we bled in the water. When we normally would have surrounded and exploited the small weaknesses (i.e. I need to go home, or I cant do another one) like a team of sharks on a bender motorcycle.
Small white in the morning, Closed eyes at a table, toilet breaking secrets in the bathroom, wounds from fire, air raids on the mini bar. These are just a few of my favorite things. Singing voice not included. Sophia saved me from loosing and became a beautiful voice of reason. Bobby lost his shit and stayed the same. Mark still amazes me with his fearless relentless drive at insane recreation. Billy is always last man standing and has more philosophies than chest hair. It’s a lot. Corey made the trip what it was for me. A thick line in the sand.
Austin was the closest feeling to home I was gonna get for a while. Mexico City showed me that. Truckloads of cops who never turned their sirens off. The strange mix of commerce and revolution. One of them always advertising for the other. The women were beautiful, the language barrier extensive. I wandered and wandered, sometimes like a roadrunner sometimes like a beast. Roamed and combed over the city walls looking at the graffiti. Eating tacos in the dark. I was scared I might get arrested if I pissed in the street but I did it anyway. I constantly apologized to strangers under my breath. I’ve been quiet since I got here....waiting to see Ben in Bogotá. Impatient to learn this language already. Jokes are my only line of defense against the staring eyes of foreign predators.
Here it was along with my first threat of violence. I saw a car wreck from about 2 feet away outside of the old soldiers pavilion on revolution road. Debris smacked into the crotch of my Levis. I whistled at it like it was a gorgeous girl. Someone smiled at me. And just like that I had told my first inside joke. No language required. Only incident.
From my chicken crossing the road to yours. From ten thousand miles away. From the banks of the largest city in the world. 6 cubana tortas and a few pig skins later.
I’ll see you in the thick. My campaneros.
No comments:
Post a Comment