6: Creation

We're waiting for the break out
And burning rods of tungsten
We're winding our secondaries
On low-speed lathes
If I could find a better way to love you
I'd have to rewire with four gauge

We can't see no difference
Between construction and demolition
Now that Shiva's using iPhone apps
To squash the old town and birth new worlds
If I could find a better way to love you
I'd need a thicker blast shield

I met dear Dr. Maxwell
By sticking screwdrivers in wall sockets
Pulling signals from the air
With varnished coils and copper in the trees
If I could find a better way to love you
I'd need a bigger ozone fan

Yes, darling. It's love.
Stand back.
Stay grounded.

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There's nothing good on the internet.  The web is flooded with drivel and dreck produced by unemployed slobs regressing to unhappy childhoods, seeking the attention they never got from parents who were distracted by game shows and cigarettes.

I have to keep rereading my last hopeful e-mail.  Hours go by.  The glow fades.  I have to read it again.

"We're interested.  Stay put."

I don't know what's worse about being unemployed - watching the assets evaporate into the aether, unreclaimable like a children's birthday song moments after the candles are extinguished, or watching the world's wheels turning fluidly without me.

There is no blip.  No interruption in the video stream.  No change of plans. No moment of silence.  One out of six billion is a very small number indeed.

Death is not nearly as terrifying as irrelevance.

I  go back to the last hopeful e-mail.  

"We're interested.  Stay put."

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We are makers of things.

I married a woman who was happy to honeymoon at a machine shop.  We learned how to turn metal on a lathe.  We went home with our classroom results and had love on a bed I stiffened with 3/4" plywood.

When we are in trouble, we build things.

I made a jacob's ladder out of copper water pipe and a neon sign transformer.  The sparks lit up our garage.  We machine our parts, setting fire to titanium.  Planting bulbs, pruning trees, hanging houses for the birds.

I write stories.  She writes lyrics.

We have a piece for musical theater about the U.S. Antarctic Program.  When we get sad I go to the piano and she hums a tune or two I pluck out of the air and press onto the keyboard.  "Antarctica: The Musical" performed nightly behind our eyeballs, just underneath the forehead.

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I'm building a Tesla coil.  A resonant high voltage power projector.  I would never have  built one before losing my job.  Too dangerous.  Too big to store in our tiny house with no closets.   

I'm building a Bedini motor, if only to show my friends this wonderfully simple design obeys the laws of physics.

We are watching episodes of Mad Men and yearning for our days in Alaska.

I wish my children were still babies.

I wish my father was alive.  

I would talk to him about my troubles, and he would remind me I was a good kid.

When we are distressed we create things.

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There's nothing but garbage on the internet.