Lit Writ: February 9

Fringe ArtsWill M. Dafoe — Published February 8, 2011

Like Christmas, the good memories become harder to remember, and every change to the routine makes you more aware of what you’ve lost. The presents are a blur, but the insults, the missteps, the interruptions to harmony last a lifetime.

And like Christmas, my reverence for the ninth is some subconscious consumption of the dregs of the cultural barrel rather than the Histories (which I’ve been meaning to get to, and might have read part of). The only reason I need to remember it is because someone thought it would be profitable to glorify this day, and he passed this message along while I wasn’t paying attention during V for Vendetta (the movie).
Right?

It’s always hard to get older.

I can remember certain physical features. A dark room, a flashing strobe light, huddled in an industrial loft lighting a cigarette, trying to discuss the merits of comic books over the sound of the band, embracing the night for what felt impossibly long. You’re somewhere in the background, intangible. How, exactly, do you see a day?

It always leaves, like clockwork, but it’s permanently burned into my retina, a ghostly, amorphous reminder, and the ninth comes alive every single time I close my eyes. Is it the precise day, some idiosyncratic appeal, some comical cosmic accident, a loop in time? Sometimes I want to sleep forever.

Is it easier to dream of a blizzard than sun-kissed bliss?

I’m more afraid of the spring. We’ll emerge from the underground—only, as I sober up, my pupils dilate and I orient myself, I’ll see that the day has gone. I’ll try to clean myself up, look presentable. But we’re both pale, and the darkness was more appropriate.

So I stand there, waiting for the storm clouds, waiting to be buried. Maybe if I could just explain? Maybe after hours of wracking my brain, searching the shallow depths, exercising every last muscle and fiber of my being, wringing out whatever meager sounds I can muster on this meaningless, pointy strand of bone, muscle tissue and tendons. Maybe you would understand then?

I still want to feel the cold air pierce my lungs. I want to ache desperately every time I take a deep breath. As long as I can hold onto the ninth, it will be winter forever and I can hide under the sheets and defiantly tell the world that the normal rules of time don’t apply to this particular day. I’ll stay awake forever.

This is my present to the ninth. Time is a one-way street, and there really isn’t any foreshadowing at all. The day meant what it meant; it’s not a beacon, an ideal or even a memory.

But does the ninth ever change? And is that cloud getting any closer?

It’s always hard to get older.

This article originally appeared in Volume 31, Issue 22, published February 8, 2011.