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XXVIV Phoney
Bologna
With Richard, the phone could be an insidious instrument of torture, a
magic portal into the future or both. His voice on his answering machine
was straight-forward except for some slight changes and sardonic
inflections, a little like his poetry. It went something like this:
“Hello,
as you can probably tell,
I’m not here right now,
but you can leave a message
for when I AM here
after the beep.”
Just by his tone I could tell how amused he was to be a voice in the
present saying that the source of the voice wasn’t present. And somehow he
managed to make the word beep sound like a little joke between himself and
the listener.
When I first knew him, I was always happy to hear his voice when he
called. I liked to play the fool to his tricky diction.
“Hello.”
“Hello, it’s me.”
“Hello, me.”
“What’s the big boy up to today?”
“No good.”
“Sounds interesting. Perhaps you can come over the hill and we can do some
damage.”
“Sure.”
“Shurrr--you Oklahomans certainly gave a way with words. On your way, how
about stopping and picking up a little Dickel.
“Black or white?”
“The sun is out and it’s June, so white. I’ll pay you back.”
“Uh huh.”
“Do I detect an element doubt in your voice?”
“Huh uh. I’ll be over in an hour or so.”
“I’ll have the ice cubes ready.”
As time wore on--through a considerable pile of both black and white label
Dickel bottles, I got so I wasn’t quite so excited about Richard and his
magic telephone. Frequently when I needed to get in touch with him about
plans we’d left vague earlier, I’d call and his phone would be unplugged,
and this would lead to odd bouts of recrimination when he’d call me
wondering why I hadn’t called. Even more disarming were his three a.m.
calls, from other countries. Sometimes they were important--as when we
were arranging for his semester residency here at M.S.U. Other times, he
might just be depressed and needing someone to talk to. Either way, they
were dream calls where I’d just been dredged up out of r.e.m. sleep.
Looking back, the calls still seem like dreams. In fact, since then I’ve
dreamed calls from Richard, and in the morning, in those few minutes
between waking and sleeping, I've wondered if they were real. Here’s a
blend of a real call and a dream call--collect.
Ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, ring.
“Hello.”
“Will you accept a collect call from Richard Brautigan?”
“Wha, uh.”
“Will you accept a collect call from Richard Brautigan?”
“Uh, Yes.”
“Hello there big boy. Sounds like I woke you up.”
“Sort of.”
“So you still must be sort of asleep.”
“No, now I’m sort of awake.”
“It’s dreary here. It’s been dreary for a long time.”
“In Tokyo?”
“No, in Amsterdam. ”
“Are you o.k.?”
“It’s dreary here.”
“So you aren’t o.k.?”
“Dreary--for a long time.”
“Do I hear the jingling of ice cubes?”
“Yes, they are very expensive ice cubes.”
“Well, they jingle nicely.”
“They should. Have you been fishing this winter?”
“Yes, ice fishing--for perch.”
“Are you still catching them by using their eyes for bait?”
“Of course.”
“Explain how you do that again.”
“I catch a perch, I stun it on the ice, I pop out an eye, I put it on the
hook, and I catch another perch, pop out its eye....”
“An eye for an eye.”
“Yes.”
“If they could talk, they would probably say, ‘I’ll keep an eye out for
you.’”
“Probably.”
“You sound tired. You should probably go back to bed.”
“Probably.”
“I’ll call you when it’s less dreary.”
“O.k.”
“Bye, big guy.”
“Bye, Richard.”
Here’s a letter I got a couple of weeks after whatever part of that call
was real.
Amsterdam
January 19, 1984
Dear Greg,
I'm sorry I woke you up at the beginning
of this month, but what else could I do? It was impossible to resist.
Love
Richard
PS Send the bill to Joe, so he can put it on the stack.
(Joe Swindlehurst was Richard’s lawyer in Livingston.)
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