Another example:  there are no parking lots.  Or at least no big expansive parking lots like we have in CA, where no matter how busy Safeway is that day you can find a spot—though a longer walk—with an empty spot on each side.  There are parking lots, but no big parking lots, is what I’m sayin’.  Not even those big parking structures or garages that are all over San Francisco.  What there is is little lots—little little—in little enclaves between buildings, and in these little enclave lots are these elevators that take your car (not that we had a car) way up into the air.  That’s what they do in New York:  put it up higher.  Everything is stacked.  McDonalds and Target are all 2 stories.  Or 3.  School playgrounds are on school roofs. 

The reason for this, of course, is that New York City is compacted with people, all of whom have stuff, into an area significantly small relative to other areas containing the same amount of people and stuff.  As we learned as we arrived at our apartment our first night in New York, dropped off at our stoop by a cynical cabbie at around one or two in the morning after a full day of travel.  We had subletted the apartment sight unseen—other than a couple of photos, but you know how that goes—from a pleasant Frenchman named Jean Louis who writes enthusiastic emails and who was studying Arabic in Spain.  I didn’t actually get a good look at the place for the first fifteen minutes, during which I battled through four trips up (and down) the three flights of narrow, steep, rickety stairs, transporting in each trip one of four sixty-plus pound and awkwardly-shaped (when climbing stairs, that is—hell on the shins) suitcases.  Once I caught my breath , I joined Liz, who had had fifteen minutes to begin perusing the joint, in perusing the joint. 

We still had our poker faces from the cab ride over in full deployment, and neither of us said much.  Here are the highlights:  First, it kinda smelled.  But then, New York kinda smelled, especially in the summer, and in both cases, we got used to it.  Second, the lesbian couple that Jean Louis had rented to before us seemed to have been rather slobbish.  As a result, everything in the apartment, from the TV remote to the hardwood floors, seemed to be coated in an unidentified grimy film.  The couple had also had a dog, and though unidentified, there seemed to be an element of dog hair subtly incorporated into the grimy film.  Also, there were food remnants caked to the inner walls of both the microwave oven and the oven oven.  This, eventually though, would be remedied by a methodical, obsessive, and desperate process of cleaning on Liz’s part (other than the oven oven, which we never opened again).

Beyond all that, the principal characteristic of this apartment was just how tiny it was.  Tiny tiny.  The entire apartment—a one bed, one bath—was at least slightly smaller (if not just smaller) than the living room of the house I live in now.  I lived in an apartment in college, and our Brooklyn apartment was about the size of the front room of that apartment, which doesn’t include that apartment’s kitchen, two bathrooms, and two bedrooms. 

The kitchen of our apartment in New York was big enough for two people to stand in, but only single-file.  If I was in the kitchen, and then Liz came into the kitchen, and then I wanted to leave the kitchen, Liz would have to first leave the kitchen, let me out, and then re-enter the kitchen.  The refrigerator door could open about 43 degrees before hitting the counter on the other side. 

Our bedroom was exactly the size of one Full mattress, a dresser, and a small walkway for humans who wished to access the bed (again, single-file only).  Of course, that first night there was no mattress, but rather the space later to be filled by our mattress was occupied by a stained futon that the next day we temporarily replaced with an air mattress that required re-inflation at intervals of every 2.5 hours, participants rising and standing sleepy-eyed in the single-file walkway area as the mattress regained its form.

Yes, Liz and I looked over our quaint, tiny, filmy new home and didn’t say a word.  We were tired and—unbeknownst to us (or perhaps known but lacking specifics)—we had other problems to begin enduring the next morning.

           “Hills, hills, hills,” he said, “All we do is hills.  Up, up, up.  Never down.  This entire country is hills.”

            “C’mon,” she said, “It’s part of the fun.  Part of the adventure.” 

            “How can I enjoy adventure when I’m about to pass out half the time?”

            “Pass out?  Come on.  It’s not so bad.  Look around you.”

            “At what?”

            “It’s beautiful.”

            “Can’t see straight.  Can’t look up.”

            “You’re missing the time of our lives.”

            “Thousands of dollars to climb hills all day.”

            “Let’s take a break.  I hate that you’re not having fun.”

            “No.  No break.  Let’s get it over with.”

            “It’s not something to ‘get over with.’ This is for both of us.”

            “Let’s just go.”

            “How can I help?”

            “Let’s go.”

            “Please.”

            “Go.”

             -Him?

             -Him.

             -Him?

             -Yes.  Him.

            -You’re kidding.

            -No.

            -No.

            -Yes.

            -Why?

            -It is your fate.

            -But look at him.

            -It matters not.

            -But look at him.

            -Listen.  You’ve been aware of this Destiny and its implications for some time now.  We raised you in an open household with open communication.  We hid nothing from you.  I mean, what did you think?

            -I thought—I didn’t think this.

            -What did you think?

            -I was picturing someone…more…

            -Handsome?

            -Yes.

            -Like a Prince Charming type?

            -Yes.

            -Well certainly you can see how that was an unreasonable expectation.

            -But, just look.  My God.  I couldn’t.

            -You must.

            -I can’t.

            -Well, I suppose if you can’t, we’ll just have to allow our village to be drowned by cats.

            -Don’t even.  Do not guilt me.

            -Just stating a fact.

            -It’s not a fact.  You’re guilting me.

            -It’s prophecy.  This is your destiny.

            -You didn’t tell me this part.

            -Well, we didn’t know, exactly.  Besides, true beauty is on the inside.

            -Don’t even.

            -I’m just saying.  Inner beauty.  You haven’t even spoken to him yet.

            -It’s not the speaking to him I’m worried about.

            -C’mon.  Give him a chance.

            -This is unfair.

            -Oh, don’t even start with that.

            -It is.

            -You know what I’m going to say to that.

            -I don’t give a shit about life.  This is unfair.

            -Think of the importance of your sacrifice.  Think of your people.

            -Ha!  You admit it!

            -What?

            -You admit that it’s a sacrifice.

            -Just think of your people.

            -You admit that it’s an unfair, stupid, butt-ugly sacrifice.

            -Just close your eyes, tighten your lips, hold your breath, and think of your people.

During those five months after the program, my routine switched to afternoons.  From 5 to 7 (with one game of minesweeper at the beginning and one at the end plus the option of one additional game commemorating any measurable or perceived accomplishment during those two hours), this change occurring mostly due to a change in school start time from 8 AM to 7:20.

But once the draft was complete, I wanted to keep up my routine and write every day, but I also lacked the energy to start something too heavy.  So I started doing this:  I would take an important date, use the largest number (usually the year) as page number, the next largest number (usually the day or the month) as line number, and the remaining number as word number.  Then I grab a book and find the word and write a one-page story (sometimes longer, but usually not) beginning with that word.  The dates I usually use are my birthday, Liz’s birthday, my mom’s birthday, Liz and I’s getting together anniversary, and now our wedding anniversary.

This didn’t actually keep up my routine, as it only takes fifteen or twenty minutes, but it has been a way to keep writing. 

Here’s one of the first one’s I did.  In fact, it’s probably the first one, because I don’t seem to have been using important birthdays yet, though the one on the next page of my notebook is using an important birthday.  So this is a one-page story beginning with the 5^th word on the 5^th line of the 50^th page of The Sun Also Rises, that word being the word, “He.”

That Phrase

He never knew what she meant when she used that phrase.  Never understood it.  But for years she’d been using it—saying it—and he’d been pretending he was right there with her, on the same page, etc.  He’d picked up, sometime early on, that the appropriate response was a mild amount of laughter—a snicker—and it had never failed to fool her. 

            She probably picked it up from her family.  Probably something some great aunt used to say.  Or her mother.  Or something her mother picked from her great aunt, or from her own mother.  Something going back to the Old World through a succession of great aunts and mothers.  For all he knew, she had as little idea what it actually meant as he did.  Just had picked up, over the years, as he had, on the appropriate circumstances for its use and the accompanying tone.  Was performing in its delivery as much as he was in its reception.

            But the fact remained, regardless of the phrase’s origins, or her understanding of it, that he had been living this lie for years, and there was no way out of it.

Here’s the link, and below is the story.  It goes better for the hamsters in the link.

Lonely Days Are Gone

It started with one hamster because he was lonely and wanted companionship and his landlord would absolutely not allow a cat or a dog but instead suggested a bird that would stay in a cage such as a parrot but the lonely man’s aunt had had a parrot when he was younger and quite possibly she still had it or probably it died but maybe she got another one he really didn’t know he hadn’t visited her in quite awhile which saddened him since he now knew what it felt like to be lonely but at any rate it had always seemed that the parrot was taunting him and it wouldn’t shut up and the thought of it reminded him of his ex-wife and that quickly turned him off of the entire bird idea so he opted instead for a hamster but of course after a few weeks the hamster was not as peppy as he too had grown lonely and needed companionship so the man went out and got another hamster that the first hamster could hang out in the cage with but the first hamster was kind of mean to the new hamster and wouldn’t share the food with him and one day the man found the second hamster dead so he threw it in the trash and went and got another hamster but this time also got a bigger cage with a retractable partition so the hamsters could play together during the day but be separated at feeding time and the hamsters seemed very happy and so the man felt happy but that night he was awakened by a lot of scratching and thrashing coming from the direction of the trash can and it turns out the second hamster hadn’t died after all but had passed out due to malnutrition but since there was plenty to eat in the trash can he was revived and so first thing in the morning the man went and got another even bigger cage with yet another partition and he put his hamsters in it and all seemed very content but one day after some time had passed he came in to find that the third hamster had had six baby hamsters and it seemed that the first hamster was helping her take care of the babies which was enjoyable for the man to watch but eventually he began to notice that the second hamster acted as if he felt left out like a third wheel so the man went and got more cages with more partitions and a girlfriend for the second hamster with whom he got along great but time passed and passed and no babies so the man took them to the veterinarian who told him that no babies were born because both hamsters were girls but this confused the man because when he had just the first and second hamsters they did not get along and had no babies so he brought in the first hamster and the veterinarian told him that that hamster was also a girl and this is when the man realized he had the first and third hamsters mixed up because hamsters kind of look alike so he went back home but not before stopping at the pet store to buy more cages with more partitions plus boyfriends for the third and fourth hamsters and over time all the pairs had babies and the babies grew and formed new pairs and more babies and before he knew it the man had lots and lots of hamsters and was very busy feeding and cleaning and buying cages and retracting partitions but the man eventually realized that the hamsters had not kept him from feeling lonely and soon after he spent a week locked in the bathroom crying and no one fed or watered the hamsters and they all died.

We flew out, as mentioned, with all of our stuff packed into 4 suitcases and with a cat (in carrier) as a carry-on.  We had drugged Rooster (the cat) at the airport in Sacramento, the drugs not knocking Rooster out but rather putting him into a trance under which he spent the next ten hours uninterruptedly plucking at the mesh screen of his carrier at three second intervals, creating a race between the plane landing and Rooster plucking his way through his carrier and running free and high around said plane.

But the carrier held up and made it to LaGuardia intact, around midnight.  One thing we learned that day—and would be reminded of several months later, walking through Brooklyn for a vet check-up—is that a 19 pound cat plus a three-quarter-pound carrier equals 19.75 pounds, and 19.75 pounds feels like a goddamn lot of weight when you’re toting it through an airport terminal.

Another thing we learned is that New York crowds are not like California crowds, and after somewhat reluctantly bumping and shoving my way through men, women, and children and one-by-one collecting our 4 overweight suitcases from the baggage carousel and depositing them onto a cart and bumping and shoving (now with the aid of a cart loaded with 200 plus pounds of luggage) our way out the sliding doors, I spotted an open cab across the street and in a fit of adrenaline—charged by an arduous hour of cat-carrying and women and children bumping—I lifted all 4 of our 50-plus pound suitcases—2 handles in each hand—and awkwardly jogged toward the cab’s open trunk.

The cabbie did not recognize the address of the Brooklyn sublet we had rented sight unseen (our key had been FedExed to us by our friend Joe), but as we came closer to what our research indicated to be our neighborhood and our apartment, the cabbie began to repeatedly inform us that, “No, you don’t live here.  Not here.”  Not “You don’t want to live here,” but definitively, “You don’t live here.”

“This is what we call East New York,” he said, “This is the worst part of New York.  You don’t live here.”  Now to get the whole picture here you have to consider that we’ve quit our jobs and sold all of our stuff other than the contents (more or less) of the 4 bags in the trunk and it’s nearly one in the morning and very dark outside and this guy is repeating over and over, “No, you don’t live here.  Not here.  You don’t live here.”  The thoughts that Liz and I were having about the situation and the hypothetical conversations our minds were each having with the other as we sit silently in the cab are probably fairly easy to imagine.  But our faces?  All poker.

As we got closer to the apartment, the cabbie’s mantra changed from “You don’t live here” to “Past Washington.  Past Washington is nice.  You live past Washington.  You don’t want to live this side of Washington.  Past Washington is okay.”  When he got to Washington, he cut over to Dean, the street we lived on.  I looked out the window at the address of a building.  Then at the next one.  “Other way,” I said, “It’s the other way.”

The cabbie drove us to our apartment in silence.  Liz and I looked at one another:  Poker.

Our plan was to depart the end of July, and by the middle of July, we still had no jobs in NY and nowhere to live.  But we did have non-refundable plane tickets.  In June, we had sold all of our furniture and appliances in a three day yard sale and had put our other belongings—those that didn’t fit into four suitcases and two carry-ons—into storage.

Though we spent most of July jobless and concerned, Liz and I had each flown to NY for interviews—me sometime in June and Liz in early July.  I interviewed with Bronx Lighthouse Charter School.  Actually, I had already interviewed with Bronx Lighthouse—a phone interview in late May—after which they had expressed how excited they were and that they just needed me to come on out and meet them and do a demo lesson.  So Liz and I bought plane tickets (more plane tickets) and flew out and got an awful room at the HoJo in the awful Bronx and I gave a seventh grade lesson on making inferences from Lewis Carroll’s “The Jabberwocky,” after which we had another interview, after which they said they just needed to bring it up to the board, which would meet the next week, and then they’d give me a call, not telling me that in actuality they would never be calling me but instead would six months later be sending me a form rejection by email, leading me to the view—perhaps out of bitterness but perhaps also because they knew I had flown from fucking California—that the folks at Bronx Lighthouse Charter School are kind of assholes.

Unlike Bronx Lighthouse, the school Liz interviewed with three weeks later, Uncommon Charter School (who, it would turn out, despite the following, are also kind of assholes) paid for her plane ticket and put her up in a hotel.  Strapped for cash from the previous trip (as well as the upcoming one), we couldn’t afford a second ticket and Liz had to go alone.  When she called me from the airport on her way home—in tears—it seemed to have not gone well, but two weeks later, when they called to offer her a job, things began to look up.  The same week, we found and put down a deposit—sight unseen—on a sublet apartment belonging to a Frenchman named Jean Louis who was studying Arabic in Spain.

So on July 31^st of 2010, our respective parents dropped Liz and I off at the airport in Sacramento, each of us toting two (two each) overweight suitcases (having planned in advance to pay for the extra bags and extra weight), a carry-on (one carry-on consisting of a cat carrier appropriately carrying a 17 pound cat), a personal item and a bottle of tranquilizers (for the cat).

Next post: Our first week in NY.

I ended up at Walmart for the same reason I assume many employees end up at Walmart, I needed a job and I needed one now because I needed money and I needed it now.  I had been substitute teaching, which in Oklahoma paid $40 a day (as opposed to $100 or $120 in CA) and where—due to the small, rural schools in Wayne and Purcell—they called you once or twice a month instead of every day.  So subbing wasn’t cutting it and there weren’t a whole lot of jobs in Purcell but Walmart was opening a new Supercenter and I got in on the mass hiring.  Literally—I was in a mass interview followed by a mass tour of the store followed by a mass handing out of blue vests and knives.  That’s right, knives, which brings me to the first thing of a few things most people don’t know about Walmart: every employee is armed.

Technically, every employee is issued a box-cutter, but really, what’s in a name?  When you want a box-cutter to be a box-cutter, it’s a box-cutter, but when you want a box-cutter to be a knife, it’s a knife.  It’s really in the eye of the holder.  The reason everyone at Walmart needs a box-cutter is that at Walmart, there is no down time.  If you’re not helping a customer or making a sale or changing a filter, you are either stocking shelves (and hooks) or you are scanning the stocked shelves (and hooks) to ensure that they are stocked correctly.  There is a steady flow of pallets, each stacked tall with boxes of merchandise, from the warehouse to your department, all of which must be opened and shelved (or hooked).  Thus, box-cutters.  So, when dealing with a Walmart employee who seems perhaps emotionally unstable—as may not be all that uncommon—think “box-cutter in pocket” before pissing them off.

The next thing most people don’t know about Walmart is that people at Walmart either worship Sam Walton or want you to worship Sam Walton.  In the staff-only areas, such as the staff lounge, there are all these pictures of Sam Walton with Sam Walton quotes, like, “There is only one boss: the customer,” and stuff like that.  Once, I commented to a fellow employee that in one picture in particular, in which Sam was sort of reaching toward the camera, it looked like he wanted to throttle one of us.  The fellow employee just looked at me with pity.

At least twice during the term of my employment, I heard an employee use a “Sam-ism,” so to speak, to either motivate or correct another employee.

But that’s not the best part.  The best part is that at Walmart staff meetings, they play Sam Walton trivia, which consists of questions about Sam Walton’s life taken from his books, which, by the way, are recommended reading.  And what do you get if you win Sam Walton trivia?  Just guess  That’s right, a better box-cutter.  A nice box-cutter with a comfy grip and new blades, instead of the crappy box-cutters that everyone gets.  And they go ape-shit for the new box-cutters.  They love them.  They name them.  They taunt those without new box-cutters.  They form new box-cutter cliques. 

The third thing most people don’t know about Walmart is the Ten Foot Rule.  When a customer comes within ten feet of an employee, that employee must stop what they are doing, smile, and ask the customer, “How May I Help You?”  Now, in Oklahoma, where people are generally more friendly (it’s true), they’re very good at the Ten Foot Rule.  In California, not as much.  But that doesn’t mean that Walmart employees in California or anywhere else don’t know about the same Ten Foot Rule they know about in Oklahoma.  So feel free to challenge your local employees.  If you’re within the ten foot zone and are being ignored, maybe a little “Ahem.  Ten Foot Rule.”  Actually, that’s mean.  Don’t do that.  To hell with Walmart and their Ten Foot Rule.

Which brings me to the final (for now) thing that most people don’t know about Walmart, which actually maybe everyone knows about Walmart:  Ten Foot Rule or not, the only thing Walmart employees are really really able to help you with is where things are in their department. They know where things are in their department because no matter how big or small the item that employee has placed that item in that spot or on that hook hundreds if not thousands of times.  But beyond that, don’t assume that every employee is an expert or even interested in their department.  Hardware people are not sent to hardware, or sporting goods people to sporting goods.  People are sent where people are needed.

For example, I worked for three weeks in the Purcell Supercenter’s Tire and Lube Express.  I changed hundreds of people’s oils.  The top-side part.  Changed their air filter, checked levels, tire pressure, etc and most importantly filled their engine with oil.  I rotated and balanced hundreds of tires.  I had no idea what I was doing.  None.  I couldn’t get a job sweeping the floor in a non-Walmart garage or tire shop.  I was taught a series of steps that I performed over and over  People that know me well know that I know nothing about cars or engines or tires.  Nothing.  Nothing.  Nothing.  So think about that the next time you drop off your keys and head inside to buy a new comforter.

Here are some pictures of those first pages I wrote while not listening to some lecture about reaching every learner, even the “exceptional” ones:

In fact, the reason I started this blog a few weeks ago is that one of the things that Red Hen said I should do on this big-list-they-sent-me-of-things-I-should-do-between-now-and-then was to start blogging.  So I did.  And it’s been fun, though it’s admittedly difficult to consistently maintain what with work and marriage and Dr. Oz every day at 4 and Christmas and all that.  When I started I was thinking it would be a daily thing.  But that didn’t happen.  Then I set a goal of 3 posts a week, and that happened for the first week.  But not the week after that or the week after that.  So this week I’m going to shoot again for 3 posts or more, but I at least know I can keep up with posting every week.

Anyway, another thing that Red Hen said I should do on their big-list-of-things-I-should-do (actually, this one was more of a must do than a should do) was to write three descriptions of the novel: a one-line description, a one-paragraph, and a one-page, all of which my wonderful wife Liz helped me with and which I’ll share here:

Here’s the one-liner:

Parnucklian for Chocolate is a dark comedy about what it is to grow up an alien in your own family and your own life.

Here’s the paragraph:

Parnucklian for Chocolate is B.H. James’s first novel.  It is a dark comedy about Josiah, a young teen who has spent his whole life being told he is special.  James’s novel examines the tall tales that exist in all families, and what happens when we lose control of them.  Josiah was raised by an overwhelmed and overwrought mother who told him his father was from the planet Parnuckle.  It seemed like a good idea at the time.  His origin mythology is a web of 1980’s pop culture references and a mad desire to make a mistake mean something.  It is a novel that examines what happens when we start to see how crazy our parents are, and how crazy we were to ever believe them.  It is a novel that shows us how grown up kids have to be, and what freaks we all are.

Here’s the pager:

Parnucklian for Chocolate is a novel about growing up an alien in your own family and your own life.  The story follows Josiah from the age of five to sixteen.  As a small child, Josiah willingly believed that his absence of a father could logically be explained by the simple fact that his father was a high ranking alien official on the planet Parnuckle.  It explained so much, such as why he should only eat chocolate and why he should be proud of and idolize his father, the Keymaster of Gozer, even though they’d never met.

But as time goes on and gaps in this mythology widen, Josiah is faced with two options: either it’s all very real or it’s all very pretend.  Both answers constitute a huge betrayal.  This comes into sharper focus when Josiah meets Bree, a prematurely mature girl who has also been repeatedly betrayed by her parents.  And when Josiah’s mother marries Bree’s father and they attempt a typical all-American nuclear family, chaos ensues—equal parts despair and absurdity.

This is a story that examines in sometimes pathetic, often hilarious style what it is to be the victim of who your parents are.  It is a story that shows just how grown up children often have to be, and how alone we leave them even when they are in our care.  It is a story that recognizes we all rely on mythologies about ourselves to make the least bit of sense of our lives.

The characters are vivid.  The scenarios are absurd.  The style is distinct.  The humor is dark.  Parnucklian for Chocolate is sure to stay with you for years to come. 

BH James has taken a bizarre situation and made it relatable and recognizable to all those who read it—alien or otherwise.

By the way, I’m being published as BH James because it’s more Googleable.  If you Google Bill James you get the baseball guy.