Dandy Darkly

An Offer of Optimism

I don't like to think I'm naive. I prefer to consider myself, instead, an optimist. I like to believe my eagerness to find the hidden answer is what sometimes (lately more often) results in my less than favorable situational hardships. Take my shitty apartment for example. There's barely any plumbing. It's beginning to freeze at night. And a week ago, I found a winged rat had chewed through my loaf of bread.

But my particular pseudoscience is a reactionary one. The ghost haunts a house, so I take steps to shoo it away. And I do so happily. The same strategy applies with my apartment. I bought a gym membership (on credit) to shower, heavier blankets to stay warm while I sleep, and a cat to slay the rat. For the record Artemis Kitty hasn't killed it yet, but I'm optimistic.

This said, I attended the wedding of Sam Hain over the weekend. Sam Hain the Scarecrow King, the Master of Halloween, the Exalted Patriarch of Pumpkins, His Haunted Holiness... 

I arrived as planned to the wedding. The annual event was held in Prospect Park at a gothic pavilion called the Picnic House. Grinning pumpkins lined the twisting path through the ancient trees to the ceremony. Merely approaching the shrine, I was made giddy by the spiritual aura emanating from the location. All this before I even saw the paparazzi. 

Mayor Gloomberg was there, calling in some favors for his struggling re-election bid no doubt. Lady Gaga, too. A variety of Manhattan and Bergen's social elite, all seeking a favor from the only groom capable of shaping destiny with a nod of his head. And me. There I was in a tuxedo bought for me, with perfume obtained from rooting in garbage high on psychedelic tea, expecting to waltz right up to Sam Hain on his wedding day and then what?

Such blinding optimism.

While credentials were checked at the door, I caught a glimpse of chandeliers made from lush ivy wound around hanging elk skulls and lit by circling fireflies. Waiters in long nosed, Italian masks served guests dainty finger foods and frosted cocktails. A brutish ogre in an elegant, white suit examined my invitation, looked me up and down and motioned to an attendant who took me through the door, but not towards the festivities.

I was ferried to a side room where stacks of presents awaited the soon to be groom and his bride. Some were lavishly wrapped with towering bows while others simply sat on the table with little fanfare. Still my optimism refused to be broken. I thought certainly I'd been shown here to place my ridiculous sewer perfume before rejoining the costumed revelers. So stupid. I wasn't allowed to leave the room. I began to panic. My temper flared. I demanded an answer as to why I was being kept separate from the other guests. Eventually the doorman who had examined my invitation came to the room. My optimism was shaken, but still held firm, certainly this mix up would be resolved. No such luck. The doorman was resolute. He did indeed let me through the door, but I was not a guest at the wedding. I never had been. I was in attendance as a wedding gift to Sam Hain.  

I was dumfounded. I began to raise my voice. What was this idiot talking about? I was there as an offering? Was that even possible? I debated the ridiculousness of the entire situation. If I were a gift, as this dullard continued to insist, then who was I a gift from? He flipped through his notes, seemingly unable to find the answer to my easy question. Then he said the name.

"Kristakos. You are a wedding offering from a Mr. Kristakos."

And my optimism crumpled.

Big Tripping in Little China (part two)

Continued from Big Tripping in Little China (part one).

Mr. Hsu sat cross legged on an opulent pillow. His head was bald and covered with liver spots. He wore a shiny, silk robe. The owner of the Opal Trading House took a slow drag from an ivory pipe.

He narrowed his eyes in my direction and exhaled slowly, "Would you care for some tea?" 

The air in the small room was choked with heavy incense and tobacco smoke.

"No, thank you." I primarily wanted to find a suitable gift, whatever this shriveled man suggested, and get going.

"Please? I insist. It's very good tea," a claw-like hand, all dead skin and curled fingernails, passed me a teacup of bitter smelling, steaming liquid. The hand then darted back within the folds of his robe. I didn't want any tea, but if I've learned anything by Kristakos' example, it's that social graces can carry you far in this midnight version of Manhattan. 

I sipped the tea and we began to talk of gifts appropriate for Sam Hain, the master of Halloween. 

I stretched my jaw muscles and mouthed out each syllable, "Halloween. HAAAAlloween. HallOOOOween. HallowEEEEEEEEEn. I really like the sound of that one the best. Halloweeeeeeeeeen. So, anyways, what was I saying? Oh yeah. When Laurie decides to take on Michael Myers, she totally sets a major slasher film precedent about standing the fuck up to your Jasons and your Freddies and... wait..." 

Suddenly I was very confused. 

How long had I been sitting there? Had I really been talking to Mr. Hsu about Jamie Lee Curtis and how her portrayal of Laurie Strode paved the way for the modern, assertive scream-queen found in the contemporary horror genre?

Oh yeah. I certainly had been. It felt like I had been doing so for hours.

Mr. Hsu quietly regarded me and took another long drag from his pipe. I was sweating. I took another sip of tea. It blistered my tongue. He smiled at me. His teeth were jagged and sharp. The fucker had snake eyes! Keep it together. I was totally trying to tell myself, like... wow it was suddenly really hot in that little room. Or was it me? I drank more tea to cool down.

"So... your store is nice. What you got around in here. For weddings for... It's a nice store by the way. Much nicer than..." I was whispering.

Then I clumsily spilled my tea. And duh. The tea! Fucking tea. Fucking Chinese snake shaman dosed me with his magic mushroom tea. 

Mr. Hsu watched me from atop an emerald mushroom. His tiny head sat on the bloated body of a sapphire colored caterpillar. I stared upwards to his perch where he slowly smoked his pipe. I was knee deep in a field of daisies, and a lazy cloud of twirling, exhaled smoke took the form of a Chinese dragon. Above us twinkled a glistening diamond sky. And a manicured hand reached down and shook the serene scene.

The daisy field 
       flew with fury 
               far above before
                             fluttering back

                                                 as...

                dainty...

              deflowered...

flurries...

I returned the snow globe to the shelf with the others, each one a showcase of a joyous memory or a moment to forget. In one, a very young bride, swathed in burgundy and black, danced with her arranged groom on their Gothic wedding night. Her perfume smelled like lavender. In another, a father received a folded flag from two soldiers in dress uniform. Sparkling tears rolled down his cheeks. His sobbing now echoed from three rows behind me. It was a loathsome sound, emotion cut directly from the man's soul, forever destroyed. The wailing intensified as I crept closer.

There he stood in his own dress uniform. His son's flag was clinched beneath his arm, the barrel of a handgun in his mouth. His bloodshot eyes met mine. He pulled the trigger. The image vanished. Floating in its place remained a small crystal object, a perfume bottle. It shined like a diamond. 

I'd found my gift.

Then it fell to the concrete. I dove to catch it, but not fast enough. The splendid bottle broke. Lavender perfume stung my eyes and overwhelmed my sense of smell. I wiped away protective tears and examined where it had landed. There were easily a hundred exact replicas. I panicked. The perfume had shattered in to itself. I panicked. Which one was the original? I began examining each bottle. They were all the same! I continued digging through the pile of bottles.  

Suddenly my hands were covered with filth. Warm water flowed around me. My panic became terror as more liquid, stinking of raw sewage, flooded into the room. It covered my shoes,  then suddenly my thighs. I lost balance. I screamed like a little bitch! I was caught in a torrential flush of water. Off balance and completely submerged I tried swimming. Perfume bottles floated around me. I grabbed as many as possible, shoving them into my pockets and kicking against what felt like glass. Through the splotchy surface I saw stacks of jars with screaming human heads in them. I looked down for my body, but it was gone.

I was nothing more but a decapitated head in a pickle jar myself. I screamed even louder. 

The NYPD officers who found me said they were responding to reports of a crazy man in an alley way. And, yep, they were. When I came to my senses, I was soaked to the bone and rolling in trash hollering about my body. A few yards away, a sewer lid had been forced open. Considering everything I'd been through, I was surprisingly lucid. The officers threatened to issue a citation, but I played the gay mania card, sobbing that my boyfriend dumped me and that I was freaked out. They found that shit more distasteful than the actual shit on my trousers and opted to move along.

Mr. Hsu's home brew had left me in a bit of lurch. Following a hot shower and some nuzzling from Artemis Kitty, I began detailing the hallucinogenic imagery I experienced. It was then I remembered the perfume bottles. I ran to the trash bag where I stashed my stinking garments and began emptying my pockets. Wrapped in a bit of soggy newspaper, I found a delicate bottle of perfume. Upon the sparkling surface there was gilded lettering which read "Eau de Toilette."

The supernatural world is not without a sense of humor.

Home Hung Overhead

My head hurts.  

But worry not intrepid purveyors of blog mine. Unlike my previous bouts of painful brain syndrome, this is not some maleficent side effect of miscast magic but rather the ill effects of drinking an infamous elixir called the 'Dok Suni Saketini', four to be exact, at a popular Korean restaurant. It was all in celebration of a new friend's birthday, followed by two vodka sodas and several beers at a local bar. Happily, the ancient potion called coffee is helping to ease my brain's burden this blustery, New York morning... And 3 pm is still morning when you've just woken up. OK?

Ah, the wonderful life of a gay bachelor: social networking, binge drinking, making a home in the filthy remains of a coffee shop adjacent to Tompkins Square Park. The elderly Irish woman on the third floor, apparently her son is the slum lord, wrote me out a lease the day I said, "Sure. I guess."

I'm not convinced I'm not illegally squatting.

I'm also realizing more and more that I didn't map out this journey to (new) New York as well as I could have. There's a space heater in the storeroom where I sleep on a cot. I brought no winter clothes with me, and already the front area gets cold in the evenings. I packed more dried up specimens in jars than I did underwear. Good news is I did bring most of my books, but daily I'm reminded of something forgotten when I go rummaging in my suitcase. I've helped myself to anything in the store's boxes, mainly broken junk and paperwork. I found a small frame with a dollar in it. I pocketed the dollar and replaced it with the Metrocard that brought me here. It now hangs above where I sleep.

The storefront window is obscured with graffiti, so I painted over the interior of the glass in black. Over that I've taped charts, maps of Manhattan, a particularly weird Cathy comic I found in the trash. The front doors are permanently chained shut. I come and go via a small back door near the washroom. There's usually a junkie passed out, tripping the pavement fantastic, in what (according to my lease at least) should be my own private alley way. I've stacked most the dusty chairs and tables against the far wall. On the floor I've begun a rudimentary circle for casting and scrying. I'm detailing it's perimeter as my journey here unfolds: trinkets, candles, etchings. I find in the long run this process creates a richer tableau for the spells worked within. 

And I have a roommate, too. A week after I moved in, dead mice began appearing on my door step. Soon after, the huntress introduced herself to me. She was a black and white tabby who readily took to an offering of tuna. I named her Artemis because the patterns of her coat shift based on the phases of the moon. Today while she makes kitten biscuits on a pile of parchment, her coat is primarily white. On Sunday (my birthday by the way), she'll be an even black and white. And on the 18th she'll be jet black like the moonless sky. The details of this magic kissed New York are making themselves more apparent as I look for them. But only if you want to see them.

My friend from last night's drunken soiree, for example, is a darling, 29 year old, slutty satyr named Kristakos. The average person on the street doesn't want to know he has goat's feet and little horns, so they don't see such. Unlike the contemporary mutants who demanded recognition, the mythological folk who've been here forever are quite content to glide under society's radar.

My coffee is cold now. I'm gradually getting back into the exorcism business. It's a tricky game, as the haunted sometimes hold less sway than the ones doing the haunting. So far I've met a few promising (paying) clients through Craigslist. Kris (Kristakos) says he knows the best connected individuals who can help me answer some questions. We're hitting the town this weekend to meet who he calls the real movers and shakers of New York nightlife. Yay... Until then, going to climb back into bed. 

Head. Hurts.