He Woke Up

*

He woke up feeling like a shot of vodka and a cigarette, worried by the mere mortality of everything, and thought: you're just so crazy. The vodka was not a good idea on top of liver disease. The cigarette was not a good idea on top of emphysema. Why would he want to destroy what they had worked so hard to create? This perfect house, this perfect life. The handsome boy who took care of everything. The garden in the middle of Bangkok, so that he never wanted to go out. Suddenly, after being stupid enough to let the boy talk him into buying a car he did not need, he was desperately worried about money. His ideas of wafting away at the Happy Hippy when the money ran out seemed all the more immediate. Calcutta. The dead zone. Honestly John, some days I think a lot about taking myself out, Gary said after flying in from some disastrous situation in the Phillipines. Put it off till tomorrow, he advised airily, as in, I feel like a drink, put it off till tomorrow. Put off disaster for another 24 hours. It's just a daily program. Today is all we have. Blah blah blah.

Gary wrote:

"The black dog awaits my every move. It stands as a sentry of the devil in front of me. If I dare go left it goes to its right, to my right it goes to its left. It is uncompromising. It is there to wear me down, to see that my destruction comes to a completion at my own hands. It has fun in its abuse of my mental faculties.
It amuses itself by giving me nano-second glimpses of life being alright before it launches its assault on my self-esteem, my feelings of hoplessness of my future, helplessness to take action, thoughts of my body image, and finally urges to take the action to depart this world.
It further amuses itself by having the victim try to explain himself to some Asian half-wit who thinks I am down because my Thai gf (pro) dropped me, that your silly romance theory has norhing to do with this. It is impossible to explain the concept of the disease in this portion of the world. "Drink mango, you'll have your eyes white, teeth bright, and makes childbirthin' a pleasure. Plus it good for lines on face."
I will call you when my phone charges."

So he sat here watching the native squirrels do their little morning escapade along the electric wires. The birds twittering in the trees. The luxury, seemingly empty houses coming into view. He could never understand why he had gone so far down. Why the light was not more enticing. Why he found himself yet again the only foreigner in a cheap hotel in a decaying part of Bangkok tourists never saw; with cheap porn playing on the television. Short stay hotels. A buffalo woman trying to charge them extra because he was a foreigner. The boy wasn't having a bar of the buffalo, and went straight to the front desk. He alighted from the bike he had paid for and stood there impervious. Nothing was anybody's business. Everything was going crazy. So he came home soiled from unhappy sex in cheap hotels; back into the garden and the fully equipped house and the handsome, considerate boy and thought: why risk everything? Why bother with the dark adventures of the dark lords? Surely you're too old now? His defences were down. He let the boy talk him into buying a car he did not need for twice what he had been prepared to spend; and thought, why, why. Perhaps it was guilt. Only he suffered when his money ran out. Everyone else in this seething city moved on to another warm body. Time was never going to stand this still. But it had. And now he wanted safety. Reform. Another heart.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/Credible-terrorist-threat-against-our-country-Obama/articleshow/6839360.cms

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama has said there is "credible terrorist threat" against America after two suspicious packages, containing explosives material, were found in cargo jets originating in Yemen with two Jewish centers in Chicago-area being their destinations.

There has been a "credible terrorist threat against our country" Obama told reporters at a hurriedly convened White House press conference after he was briefed by his top intelligence officials and national security aid on the latest terrorist threat to the US.

Obama was first informed about it at about 10-35 pm on Thursday and has been updated on the developing plot throughout.

The Administration will not spare any efforts in investigating the origins of the suspicious package, he said.

Obama said agencies have "identified two suspicious packages bound for the United States, specifically, two places of Jewish worship in Chicago."

The packages were identified in Dubai and Britain, he said.

"Initial examination of those packages has determined that they do apparently contain explosive material," he said.

In his statement, Obama vows to take "whatever steps are necessary to protect our citizens of this type of attack," and he announces that there will be "additional screening" of some planes in Newark and Philadelphia.

More "protective measures" will be taken for "as long as it takes," he said.

http://www2.godanriver.com/news/2010/oct/29/3/perriello-obama-must-renew-past-virginia-magic-ar-616891/

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (AP) - On a cold, clear late October evening, an excited, standing-room crowd waited for hours in a downtown outdoor amphitheater waiting for a glimpse of Barack Obama.

That was exactly three years ago, when the Illinois senator was a long shot for the Democratic presidential nomination and a deeply unpopular Republican was in the White House.

On Friday night, President Obama returned to the same venue to campaign for Rep. Tom Perriello, an endangered freshman Democrat running in a moderate-to-conservative rural district with their party now unpopular.

It's the first trip Obama has made in the 2010 midterm elections for a House candidate, and a gamble that the president's visit will motivate more uncertain voters to support Perriello on Tuesday than those who favor Hurt.

In 2008, Perriello edged deeply wounded Republican Rep. Virgil Goode by 727 votes out of more than 300,000 cast in the Democratic sweep of Virginia that Obama led. Now, polls show Republican Robert Hurt slightly ahead. But both campaigns concede that the race has tightened in the past few weeks.

Joan Wicks of Charlottesville was among several thousand people who waited for hours to see Obama at the Charlottesville Pavilion, just as she had to three years ago when another overflow crowd included children costumed for Halloween trick-or-treating.

"Oh, there's no shortage of enthusiasm here. There's as much as there was that night. Really, I think there's more," said Wicks, who canvassed door-to-door for Obama's campaign in 2008 and did the same for Perriello this fall.

What Obama must do for Perriello, Wicks said, is persuade the thousands of young, new voters he energized two years ago that the reforms they wanted will be reversed unless they show up at the polls for Perriello next week.

Greg Varney of Charlottesville was also in the pavilion three years ago when Obama spoke. The Navy veteran said that even with Obama at his side, Perriello has a tough task persuading an impatient and frustrated public that the Democrats policy priorities can still rescue a floundering economy.

"The general public is buying the political rhetoric," Varney said. "People have been led to think that you can turn things around instantly. You can't turn it around in a year, or even a couple of years."