The Writer

It is 1967 and a lanky man in brown pants, no shoes, a well worn stripped button-down shirt, and an out of place new light blue canvas fedora on the back of his head sits in a desolate and nearly run-down hotel room with heavy gold and stained curtains drawn and a solitary light on at the small wooden desk with seemingly heavy books on one side, bestrewn wrinkled papers on the other, and a portable grey typewriter that looks as though it was from the last great war. More books on the bed all open as if an instatiable hunger still goes unfulfilled, the man emotes, gestures, and seems to talk to himself acting out a scenario where all the actors are in his head. What is he doing? With just enough knowledge to have more questions than when he began, he begins to bang on the keys with a few words reserved for the Seventh Fleet on Bugis Street. It is a stream of consciousness half filled with rage and half with compassionate understanding as he questions the world in which he lives. Again, what is he doing? Is he mad and lost his mind or just plain pissed off? And what about the words on the page? Will they have any effect? He orates well but almost randomly as the thoughts come into his head from his heart or his gut oblivious to the street noise and stereotypical flashing light outside his window as the hot oppressive night air blows through rattling the papers and the curtain rods. Is he a deep thinker or is this just dime store dialog? It is hard to tell. And with a few more fits and bangs on the keyboard inbetween outbursts he finally reaches a sensory filled crescendo and sits back in the chair with a nerve wracking creek and a pop calm again and seemingly satisfied for the moment. At least until the next round of unprovoked passion and quandry. Perhaps it will be tomorrow or later tonight? Only his maker knows. For now he seems at peace once again. He picks up a stale half-smoked cigarette from the ashtray and lights it bringing it slowly closer to his unshaven face with his thin arm with long and course hair, sleave rolled up, and swollen and bruised knuckles, drawing slow and long deep in thought as his stained hand shakes with withdrawal and blows a thick plume full of newly released tension. Freud is wrong. A cigar is not a cigar as he takes another long satisfying drag. And what about the open black sample case beside the chair? Then a determined hard steady knock at the door as he turns quickly with fear sitting upright once again his hand on the front edge of the arm of the chair and the cigarette still smoking rising in a heavy spiral trail. He pauses silently. Frozen.