With corporate influence into government you receive faceless unaccountable decision making. Corporatization of healthcare, mortgage lending, and 19^thcentury energy resources take advantage of individuals rather than aid them. The person is buried for profits.

There is nothing more aggravating than having to talk to some third party corporate broker (who only gives you their first name) to determine how much your sickness is going to cost.

There is nothing more disgusting in borrowing money from some abstract corporate bank who then slice and dice your debt and then change the fine print behind your back. There is no one to talk to in the end except an automated phone system.

There is nothing more disturbing than corporations that make billions of dollars who then barely put it back into the environment and whose profits are based on waste. Try rationalizing and breaking down your electric bill.

-XF Pine

The only progress has been via bubbles whose excitement was redacted by panic.

Maybe the disruption has begun. Maybe we are fooling ourselves with our castles in the air. I wonder if are at some invisible turning point of some huge cycle.

We’ve misguided wars thinking that we were the good guys, but never claiming any victories because we denied we were conquers. So we pay for all the wars. We are selfless good guys by principal but tempted always to be bad.

Are we better off? We are more mistrustful of nature and our frameworks. We trust technology to a fault. We are emotionally stuck in the 16th century. We are dependent upon the unseen. Everyone’s problems are our own problems.

NYC has turned into the Panopticon I always thought it would be. Privacy is a misnomer. Facebook is big brother. Your peers have sent you an invite. The government knows who your friends are.

I’ve lost my health and the faith in my physical body in the last decade. The older people I loved and trusted have passed on. There is no one in a room praying for me on a daily basis. There are only people who hate each other in their narcissism.

I’ve been through a half dozen relationships in ten years. Some of these I still fantasize about. In the end I wrecked them all because I couldn’t understand love or compromise. I couldn’t communicate. I couldn’t be happy. I became someone else for people until I became exhausted. I fooled myself as much as I fooled others.

I have been distracted by my purposes and technology. I have struggled with worth. I have realized that too much freedom makes you inert. I have realized that everything is faith and the quality and quantity of faith must be reciprocal to the number of obstacles and their intensity. Faith is a scale of coping and adaptation of the unknown. Its levels are infinite as are the boundaries of success.

I’ve realized that everything is an act of improvisation and sensibility is complete collision. Money is an uncomfortable chair you must sit in for hours. It is better than standing, but makes you lazy and makes you feel like you are always missing something accidental that may be more comfortable and lush.

I attempt to listen to the good progressive voices in my head, but they lead me to isolated places where I question if they are random sounds like all the sounds that inject fears into actions I used to love.

I must focus on mentors and surround myself with people I respect. I must cut out all noise from my life.

- X.F. Pine

Some of these stories were made into the book True Tales of American Life (First published under the title I Thought My Father Was God, and Other True Tales from NPR’s National Story Project 2001)

The story was originally accepted and then cut at the last minute from the book due to space.

———————————————————————————————————–

Paul Auster,

This is a great Experiment. I heard about it on the radio and decided to get this down and send it out.

This is all absolutely true. The pictures included are part of my story.

A while back when I was going through my things and preparing for a move, I came across a drawing that looked as though it had been done when I was four or five years old. The drawing is not dated.

The drawing illustrates a red three story building at an intersection with sidewalks. The building is surrounded by defunct cars, tires, and machine parts. A fence surrounds the lots around the building. There is a traffic light, and a neighboring building across the street where the angle of the intersection is slightly obtuse.

What has intrigued me endlessly about this particular drawing is that it accurately depicts an apartment in Brooklyn in which I would eventually live nearly 16 years later.

The similar real world location is at 14 Bayard Street in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. It is directly across from McCarren Park on the south side, and has not changed a great deal since I lived there a decade ago. The building is a lonely three story building with red asbestos tile. There is a chimney on the right side of the roof exactly like the drawing. The building is surrounded by junked cars, tires and garbage, just as in the drawing. A fence surrounds the lots like the drawing. There is a traffic light out on the corner with sidewalks like the drawing. The angle of the intersection is very similar, and there is another apartment building placed exactly as it is in the drawing. If you take the elements apart they are almost too accurate to be inconsequential.

The only difference I can find is that the door on the building is in the center, while the real 14 Bayard Street, has its doorway on the left side. Interestingly, if you look at the drawing even closer it seems as though I started to draw a structure on the left side, similar to the stoop overhang and which the real building currently has.

It’s so close however, that when I first came across it I recognized the drawing immediately as where I was living. It was also the first apartment I ever had in Brooklyn and was really my first introduction to an “urban” environment.

Now this could have been only a coincidence of course, and a bizarre stretch of the imagination, only it happened a few years later with another place in which I lived.

This time I clearly made the drawing in the late 1980’s while I was actually living on Bayard Street.

The second drawing depicts a suspension bridge stretching away into the distance over a river. The structure of the bridge looks as though it is built in many latticed levels. The aspect ratio of the drawing is easily 2:1, so it almost looks like it is in Cinemascope.

In 1995 I moved  into a unique sublet on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. One dominant feature of the apartment was its marvelous view of the river and the Willaimsburg Bridge. Again, I again came across this drawing after I lived in the space.

One curious aspect of the bridge drawing is that it seems to depict a huge fire, or plume of smoke, emanating out of Brooklyn. I haven’t been able to identify this smoke with any real occurrence. There was a train crash on the bridge one summer close to the spot in the drawing, and once one of the towers caught on fire, but nothing that large and on the distant horizon. The frame of the window is similarly rectangular, although not 2:1, and the element of the latticework of the bridge, makes it resemble the Williamsburg closely. I’ve often thought that this smoke in the picture might illustrate a calamity to come, but fortunately for everyone, I will be moving from this location in less than a month.

I find it very curious that I seem to consistently be making a record of the places I have lived before I have lived in them.

If anything else it encourages me to keep drawing.

Regards,

X. F. Pine

P.S. On a side note (you should hold onto your hat if you are wearing one), one of the very first exterior shots in the movie Smoke shows the Willamsburg Bridge from the Brooklyn side. If you look closely in the back, beyond the bridge, I believe you can see the apartment window where I am currently writing this letter. The building is definitely visible.

So there!

Best,

- XFP

When I was about twelve I convinced my Mother to get the first Atari 400. My Father thought it was a fad. Perhaps he was right after thirty years, as technology has finally become a fashion accessory.

My friends all got them too and before long we were obsessed with gaming and programming. We would spend hours, even days locked away in suburban basements and rec-rooms staring at screens. We would trade the latest software. Some kids became experts at piracy in their curtain closed bedrooms. All piracy was offline. This was at the advent of 300 baud modems with acoustic couplers that you attached to your phone. This got you to an online bulletin board that was only text. The computers had no drives built into them. There were clunky tape drives or disc drives for storage.

I look back at this time and think about how seduced we all were. I also realize how patient we were. I’ve gone back to these computers and games and discovered how incredibly tedious they were; so brutally un-adaptive compared to now.

I wonder if there is now a certain saturation point or a distinctive timeframe where you eventually become exhausted of a screen. Is this point part of your advancing age or is it finite. Perhaps after 10,0000 hours of staring at a screen in your life, it becomes confining. If you conservatively looked a screen for an average of 4 hours a day over thirty years, it would be something approaching 5 years of your life.

When you are twelve you do not think about the future. You do not think about results and implications. You don’t think about reality all that much. Recently I cannot get my head around the idea of how commonplace digital technology has become over security. How kids have no sense of their own privacy and enjoy putting their lives online for the sake of marketers and corporations. They don’t see the corporations because they are so influenced by their peers. Their comfort zone is the screen.

The dark side of pervasive computing is that you don’t see where your data is going. You don’t think about it like when you were twelve. It’s perfect collectivism. Facebook is an awesome conformist tool. Any Fascist regime or Dictatorship from history would have loved Facebook as long as they had the keys to the backdoor.

Cracks in the walls of cyber-security mostly stem from social engineering or humans who give out information recklessly. If you are twenty-five and working for a major corporation or a bank is your default to share everything or do you have to be reminded to not give out secret knowledge? A curious problem is coming to a head. We have lost all respect for information. It’s our downfall. We are all eternally twelve.

- X.F. Pine

In Tesla’s mind it was also capable of transmitting energy without wires. If you are unfamiliar with Tesla you must read this as a premier to get the whole picture. He conceived AC current, radio controlled robotics, cell phones, and a plethora of influential inventions (+700 patents) which set the foundations of the 20th century mad sciences.

Construction on the extensive laboratory and tower began in 1901 to become a part of Tesla’s Global System with J.P. Morgan as a primary backer. Also in 1901 Marconi successfully transmitted a radio signal across the Atlantic by using patents Tesla had invented although Tesla received no credit until after his death.

According to this In 1904 NY Times article, Tesla received the land for free to help develop a wireless radio resort community and had plans of putting similar towers in population areas. He claimed that the magnifying transmitter would be able to emit a wave complex of 10 million horsepower.

By 1903 the tower stood 187 feet high and was visible from New Haven, Connecticut across the sound. There were accounts that year of the tower briefly being turned on and bolts lighting up the night sky from the top of the tower. People noticed electrical sparks from their feet to the ground when they walked nearby. There are tanks in the main building which were reportedly used as massive batteries.

As the ambitious prototype neared completion Morgan backed out of the funding. Historians speculate that this was due to Tesla’s philosophy of giving electricity away for free and there was no way to “put a meter” on what Tesla had planned.

“Homes, farms, offices, factories, villages, libraries, museums, street lights, etc., could all be powered wireless and produce brilliant white light 24 hours a day. Motor energy for any industrial applications, transportation, tractors, trucks, trains, boats, automobiles, air ships or planes could be powered freely-anywhere on the planet from a single Magnifying Transmitter.”

Without Morgan the entire laboratory was in jeopardy. Tesla secretly mortgaged off the property to the owner of the Waldorf-Astoria to cover debts of $20,000 dollars. By 1917 they had the tower blown up for scrap. The site changed hands a few times over the years.

What remains is very perplexing and mysterious. The site was taken over by AGFA in the 1960s and they proceeded to poison the site with photo chemical toxins. It is now posted as restricted Superfund site although it was supposedly cleaned up by 1993. I also discovered it is currently for sale for $1.65 million dollars “as is”. The complex has 14 buildings on 15 acres. The original low brick building with the ornate smokestack which was designed by Stanford White is partially still there. The site of the huge tower is a strange octagon shape which is fabled to have honeycombs of tunnels and dormant spiral staircases beneath. Depressing rusted barbed wire surrounds everything.

As I walked around the lonely perimeter I was struck by the concept that this is where the 20th century branched off in the wrong direction. We’ve built a superstructure on dwindling commodities that we are fatally dependent upon from food distribution to heating our homes. Telsa’s execution may have been premature, but the concept of free energy transmission is profound given our current global circumstances. To think that this lost dream collapsed over a century ago is disturbing. The deeper you look into it the more you realize that Tesla knew things we still cannot comprehend. To go forward you must look back. The greatest scientific achievements are giant leaps of faith.

-XFP

Man has a clipboard and confronts an old woman.

MAN: Well, If you don’t want to sign the petition, it’s up to you.

OLD WOMAN: That’s right.

MAN: It’s a…

OLD WOMAN: You can’t make ME!!!

MAN: Fine.

OLD WOMAN: I’m not going to sign it!!!

MAN: You don’t have…

OLD WOMAN: That’s dirty money…

MAN: Mammm…

OLD WOMAN: Regan wipes his ass with my money!!!

MAN: I’m not trying to…

OLD WOMAN: He took it from me and he’s wiping his ass with it.

MAN: I’m sorry.

OLD WOMAN: He took it… You RAT-MEN took it!!!

MAN: I…

OLD WOMAN: You RAT-MEN. You stay away from  me!!!

MAN: Just…

OLD WOMAN: You RAT-MEN.  You took my money… RAT-MEN with your cocks!!!

MAN: Be…

OLD WOMAN: RAT-MEN … I want my money back. You can’t take it. You’ll see.

Man with clipboard leaves defeated.

OLD WOMAN: You RAT-MEN can’t get away…

- X.F. Pine

As I’m on the treadmill at night I notice the moon edging over a building on the horizon. It’s a huge timeless full moon. I am covered in moonbeams through the window as I run. I become witness to an Indian runner from hundreds of years ago who runs across the desert sands under that same moon. The night is cool and travel this way is easier. The young Indian is barefoot and must be careful to step on soft sand. Sharp objects and shrubs are easily visible in the moonlight. He runs towards the flat horizon. He runs some twenty miles in a night. He imagines rhythms and chants and sings them to keep his pace.

Before I can complete the novel locked in a room I must confer with my Soviet counterpart who is near Moscow on an open line dedicated phone. It is not a red hotline, but a black shiny phone. The connection buzzes and cracks but Vasiliy (The King) is at the other end. He is overjoyed and enthusiastic about my recent decisions in the narrative. He urges and inspires me to press on. I look out the window at the sunlit garden below my window, but I cannot go outside.

X.F. Pine

A huge barrel shaped goon with a tiny head hoists a large safe on the arch of his back. The combination has been lost. He puts it down as he tries to organize the derelict lot. You walk past pretending not to notice an old bass violin with no strings leaning against a wall. You are positive there is a rat under the grass at your feet.

You hear another man speaking to the goon while he picks up more junk, “We should have gotten into this business, we’d be rich by now.”

You walk out of the lot.

The express train doors close and the thieves are in the corner of the car. The two drunk men stand in large unkempt suits laughing hysterically. They stumble with the unsteady train as it starts up, and the sound that comes through the broken door is as loud as hell.

The taller one with the mustache violently pulls out a large roll of money. He tries to count it and divide it up. The other small drunker thief in sunglasses waves a dozen thick gold chains in his stubby hand. The lights dim and flash out for a moment as the train hurtles past stations. The thief in the glasses begins laughing again as if he is splitting. The tall thin one loses his grin, as he is mesmerized by the bills.

After a moment of counting, he looks at his friend with alarm. He shoots a paranoid expression over the rest of the train. He becomes serious and begins shouting only it is too loud to hear. It all sounds like nonsense.

You remember a story about a young kid who comes to the big city to be a singer. He sacrifices it all in a number of years and never gets a return. His nights wash into alcoholic angst. His act becomes loud, annoying and disgraceful. He falls into a group of similar people who feed off of fake compliments. They are a party crowd and they keep each other alive until one of them gets in an unmitigated accident, causing the whole group to be offset. The particular young man whose descent we have so wickedly had the honor of tracing finally returns to a trailer home in Florida where he grew up. His only keepsake is a bright red scarf which was worn by one of the ladies of the group.

A young man hands out leaflets about his jewelry business at the foot of an escalator in a busy train station. The fliers have line drawings of the perfect diamonds which he spent days rendering. Everyone thinks collectively of diamonds on their long commute home.

X. F. Pine

BD and I walked around the park earlier with a fake rubber spider on a hemp rope. The “spider trick” as it is known, proved to be most effective to the people in the park. The small slighted children believed it was real “P-P-P-P-P-P Arana es grande – Arana es in me CASA!!” The spider trick gets them every time.

I spoke to an old Orthodox priest before it rained. He was dressed in a purple uniform which rose wildly in the air. He had been extradited from the old church by the park in the 1960s. I told him the bells would wrestle me from sleep in the morning. He asked me if I ever attended a service there. I asked him when the services were. He said when the bells rang. He also said that the church was one of the last ever built partly by the czar Nicholas of Russia before the Russian Revolution. He was was kicked out of the church for letting the Spanish in (The priest, not the czar).

The festival was rained out just before the mighty Shorty Jackson Band were to take the platform. Shorty is a Jazz piano player from Harlem who was also an undertaker. I believe he is almost ninety years old. The band drives around in an old Dodge. It is amazing to watch Shorty play the piano. He’s been playing so long his skill is automatic. I’ve seen him at Teddy’s very late at night, having complete conversations while playing old ragtime.

There was a dead cat on Bayard St. the same night the locks didn’t work.

X.F. Pine

I must rip all the bushes and branches from the grotto, with long swoops of a scythe. The bricks from the garden must be removed to make way for the pathway. The trellis is now visible by the entrance. It holds the vines and the brush high above your head as you enter. By the end of the days work, the pathway is cut perfectly to the yard. This will be a place to retreat for he summer. A table and chair are needed.

4-3

The bridge is filled with nameless faces from the past. Persons whose faces you can only remember through a picture. Their names evoke a lost distant place and memory.  Most of us are traveling in one direction. I see JD approaching from the opposite way down the causeway. We barely acknowledge each other in passing. She wears a thick red jacket which is much to heavy for the warming weather. I realize, that upon reaching the center of the bridge I must return to the side which I came from.

4-4

BB and I wait outside the bar for hours. We joke about the performance we are about to see. Inside, I find myself alone at the end of the dark wooden bar. JD is at the far end of the restaurant wearing glasses. RR appears and shows the barmaid a map or drawing he has done. The barmaid is excited by his appearance. He explains the drawing on the bar right in front of me. JD walks over, glances at the piece of artwork, and walks away.

4-9

Deep within the Scum House is where all the low life from the town live. Walking down the long hallway I am trying to get to the hidden door. I need to get to school. I almost stole a bicycle to get there on time. In the hallway I see the police in their riot gear. Their radios are buzzing. There are circular floating lights. The police have just taken some piece of scum out the door. People are stretching and screaming with vengeance. There has been a fight in the small room where I almost trip over an empty beer bottle. The floor is covered in vomit. Everyone is trying to get out the small door. A man walks up to a spigot to fill a bucket with water. The sound it makes sounds exactly like more vomiting. This causes a bum to appear sick right in front of me. His mouth is about to burst with vomit. His expression is extreme. I manage to dodge out of the way and get out the front door. On the great big green front steps is the rich man’s daughter with her scum boyfriend. She looks at all the confusion with wild innocent eyes. She is from a home very much unlike this. She is here because it confronts her rich daddy’s life.  She wears the thinnest silver chain around her neck possible.

4-10

JD and I meet on the street and we both become very coy. I ask for her number. She giggles with delight. I tell her mine on the condition that she doesn’t send any big friends of hers over to beat me up. She laughs more. We are headed in the same direction laughing.

4-11

Sitting at the table, they bring out the new hat design which perfectly resembles a bowling ball cut down the center. It is also bright, furry and friendly. The finger holes rest right above the forehead. The hats look supremely stupid although it is our job to pretend otherwise. We soon discover the practical problem that the wearer cannot hear anything at all while the product is being worn.

4-13

The convention is taking place across a sunny field from the house of science where our team is staying. Within the large space of the hall are exhibitions featuring gas weapons and torture devices in different colored booths. The fascists are involved in this to some degree. Their streamline human statues of the state stand at either end of the hall. The bronze statues hold spears. Suddenly a revolutionary pulls a machine gun from a black bag he has over his shoulder and begins to destroy one particular display related to historic gas masks. The display is riddled to pieces by bullets. It is then that the seemingly solid statues become mechanized and launch their spears towards the dangerous revolutionary. The spears meet their target perfectly and impale him in an ‘X’ fashion. He is dead within moments and everything has grown silent. All of us on the team realize that we are under complete automatic surveillance all the time. The fascists control everything we do. Later as we are headed back across the field to our quarters we see a tremendous Calvary offensive far in the distance. We think it’s a movie it is so perfect. Before reaching the house of science we meet a little black child who wants to play some more football in the field. He pretends his arm is withered and glowing green, and then it turns out he isn’t pretending. It is all bone and he brags about how it glows in the dark. These are the curious effects of our science. It is then years later and I am standing outside of myself as I have become a religious preacher in a pulpit. I am watching myself repeat the same words over and over tying to get my new profession correct. I have traded in my life of science for one in God.

4-19

I leave the Irish vixen with the dimples on the train and return to the city and its white sculptures.