Snow Storm

I am in the satellite room of a clean room area in a familiar factory. The interior is a bright white. I am there with a myriad of male and female students. At first I think I am in training, but this is not the case. I am in design school and this class has just wrapped up for the day. There is small, end of the day talk passing back and forth between students, and I make a note that Cathy Choi is here, a classmate from second grade to the end of elementary school. We have some small talk and I note the design projects. Mine is a burnt sienna colored graphic novel full of high drama.

Out in the parking lot it has snowed and I have left a rear car door open. As I am cleaning out the snow, a housewife/student engages me about the Dodge Magnum I am driving. Because I had to park the vehicle on a high snowbank when I came to class, the vehicle appears much taller than it is in reality. A group of soccer moms gather and coo about the large storage space on the rear of the vehicle. I am perturbed, trying to make it home in the suddenly developing snowstorm. I leave.


Driving is challenging on the foot of tightly packed snow that comprises the road, and I am winding through a neighborhood I am not familiar with. A snow plow robot is clearing a perpendicular street. It scares me and then stops short of hitting my car. It's method of plowing is mindless and haphazard, but at least whatever property/person sense device hasn't frozen and injured me. The robots diesel roars back to life, and it continues plowing in another random direction. I make a right hand turn in the snow onto what I hope is a street. Houses are getting closer together here and I instinctively know I am approaching a down town area. The storm is getting worse and now I am behind a motorcycle with a plow attachment making it a six wheeler, The wheels are large, charcoal, and industrial, and at first I think it is another robot. I am stuck behind the vehicle and cannot make a safe pass. The moto-plow stops and a rider appears from the left side and approaches. It is a mousy young lady. Very young and showing some very angry looking acne. She begins to interrogate me about my destination and she gets close. I can feel the heat from her breath. She's recently eaten a hot dog. I am not interested in her, but she continues to press in, applying pressure in her actions, trying to break me down. I realize this is a battle of will and in this round I am victorious and extradite myself from these spontaneous proceedings and continue homeward.

I arrive home and try to remove my wet clothes in my kitchen, as to not track the water inside. I am startled by my father entering the house. He has had an accident in Ohio. A collision has occurred between his red Dodge pickup and a motorcycle. I am glad he is OK and help him unpack the truck.

When we are finished the motorcyclist comes into the house. He is in grave shape with a external fixtures on his arm and leg and a halo holding his head steady. He explains that the accident was entirely his fault and that he really likes my Dad. Greatest man he's ever met. I agree with him. My wife comes into the room, and I note that the kitchen bar has change from an L-shape attached to one wall to a square island. Design school is really paying off. This design allows traffic to both side of the sun room. I like it. I note the chairs surrounding the island/bar are narrower and more numerous, with a slight hint of Asian influence, treated with black lacquer. My wife comes over the one of the chair and sits. In a few moments it breaks and she scolds me for buying poorly made furniture, but in my mind I am fairly sure I designed it as a model and it wasn't intended to be used.

I say nothing.

The Jesuits

I can see a overhead view of the bar and grill that I am in. It is in Boston, and has dark, hard wood floors, scuffed and clean. I can see the mahogany bar presiding before a long table. At the table sits about 24 men in dark suits, sober and silent. I spiral down clockwise to my 1st person view and can see a large chalk board that has the daily specials on it. I see the bar in its entirety and it reminds my of a seafood restaurant at the Charleston Town Mall. The special is a rib-eye (rabbi) steak. I can see that the table and know instintively that it consists of Jesuit priests and a wing of Vatican accountants. I can see the expressions showing the stony and grizzled expressions of men who are told that they have cancer. I talk to the bartender, about the ancient chalkboard that this bar is famous for. It seems like the chalk board s older than anything I've ever seen. The conversation then turns to the table of catholic emissaries. I am told by the bartender that the men have a mission to find, the ultimate relic, in its extant form, the actual body of Christ . The acceptable forms of the remnants of the body of Christ is soil, ash, and honey. The actual and real body of CHRIST! It seems the ultimate silent admission, a denial of every tenant of belief. I note this, and fade into a different scene, in which I realize with a heavy feeling that a former relationship actually had a sideline in pornography. I never get to interact with the person, only seeing the images,against my will, repeatedly. When it is over, I a convinced of the truth of it, and begin to anguish.