OF MICE AND BUILDINGS

Dreamt of rodents last night. Mice and rats mostly. All in NYC. First, I was in the alternate New York I dream of from time to time. Lisa and I were living in some shabby little apartment way out in one of the boroughs, somewhere still full of old buildings owned by landlords you never see, all the apartments tiny and falling apart. We were having rehearsals for some show in our apartment, had been up all night, and finally were asleep, when some workers from the unseen landlord arrived, unannounced and with their own keys, and started ripping apart some walls to do some kind of electrical work. We tried to ignore them at first, but the work was very loud, and then they started working our living room/bedroom. I got up, screamed at them that I was going to call the authorities, and the grudgingly left. It was then that I noticed there were mice all over the place. Maybe a dozen or so, scampering around. Not cute mice with big eyes, but NYC mice which are basically little rats that want to eat your toes. The dream then cross faded to me downtown, in a parking lot full of people doing some sort of sit down strike. I was looking for my friend Elena, who runs the New York International Fringe Festival, who for some reason had become the borough president. She was on a flat bed truck, driving slowly around the parking lot, which was huge, waving and shaking hands. People were cheering. Whatever it was they were there for, Elena was clearly on their side. She spotted me, and I climbed up onto the truck and said hello. She told me she wanted to catch up, but first had to go take care of a few things, and invited me to join her. I said sure. First, we went to this really awful old apartment building. It looked condemned. As we walked into the building, there were all these snapping sounds, like traps being sprung. Sure enough, the place was overflowing with mice and rats, and when we walked in, a bunch of traps had gone off. And these were industrial strength traps. They had cut off some of the rats legs. But it didn't kill them. It seemed to just make them insane and angry. Like little zombie rats. Even their severed limbs were still alive and bouncing after us. Elena told me not to mind them and to follow her. So, wading through hundreds and hundreds of vermin, we made our way into the building. I could hear their bones crunching under my feet. We made our way to a balcony on a higher floor, which was fairly rodent free. I looked around, and their were several fancy new buildings nearby, impossibly shiny and large. And active. One building in particular was like the robots in the Transformers. It would shake, move about parts, and then become a new type of building, Every few minutes. I wondered aloud how anyone could stand to be inside a building that was constantly rearranging itself, and Elena said "some people like that sort of thing." Then the person she was there to see texted her announcing his arrival. We went to another room to find him. He had brought more traps, and had killed all the mice and rats, and was sweeping them into huge piles. Then he reaching into the piles, pulled out a carcass, and started eating it.

Happily, Padfoot woke me up right then. So I got up and let him out. It was around 4:30 or so in the morning. The world was quiet. Well, not the world. The people in my neighborhood were quiet. But the birds were up and having a very loud breakfast luncheon in some nearby tree. Even now, in the midst of so much uncertainty and sorrow, so much anger and division, I find the world beautiful and magic. I suppose I might be insane. It's okay if I am. I have always suspected that we are all indeed mad here. There's a sort of comfort in madness. And a glint of a hope that perhaps through madness comes a form of crazy wisdom. And that wisdom is love. Pure and simple. When I say love, I don't mean skipping along tossing daisies on front of you, although that does sound fun. And I don't mean poems, or sex, or hour long hugs, even though those are all fun too. I mean the realization that we are all connected. To everything. To rocks and trees and dogs and birds. So maybe I do mean skipping and tossing daisies. But not only that. I find solace in love. And purpose. And joy. And I felt love this morning, standing in the backyard with my dog, listening to the birds.

Here's a song. It's Things Grandchildren Should Know by The Eels.