Interview w Flightless Seagull

An Interview with a Flightless Seagull


So JC, being a part time writer, how do you feel about it?

It seems as doing this writing thing is getting harder and harder to do. These thoughts dance in JC’s mind like Native Americans nestling a day’s kill with a big kettle of Buffalo stew. They don’t last, and like stew, they both get eaten or get too cold to be eaten anymore. They also remind JC of bunny rabbits, or whack a mole. How JC long to grab hold of that mole and take it out of its hole to beat it within an inch of its life. Writing is a stranger to JC, and always will be. In all of it’s glory, its beautiful and JC can live in a dream world for moments at a time, give the world JC’s own word and emotions and feel exorbitant when others glorify it and dip their brain cells in it like whiskey. In another moment, JC feels frustrated enough to go postal and shoot off the entire mall full of children and women in little skimpy outfits, and how coffee tastes held in your mouth for a full minute. Every other skill in my life was learned, and there is a J curve to it.
You live through that curve, the sweat, the blood, the wavering will to go on. You break through that shit and you become decent at something. With writing, that curve is non-existent for JC. Writing was never hard for JC, JC always needed that little push, and even the most name athletes and heroes of the world needs that one person or friend to just give him that one word, tell him he is worth something and he has it in him and he will force it out of him for his own good. JC just feels lazy to go with it sometimes, and keep convincing myself that he is not good enough to write a novel, let have the patience to stick with a single idea for months and years on end like all those budding novelists out there. JC salutes you.

How was the experience like coming to America?

I remember coming into America, barely grasping the vocabulary of the 3rd grade as Mrs. Yaffie would scream the shit out of me when I broke her fossil skull in half one afternoon as we were about to leave class, that hurt. My mother said I cried because I couldn’t get along with the rest of the kids, and I still do remember that punk’s face when I lived in Long Island two months into the country with my cousin.
I didn’t speak a lick of and Anglo-Saxon tongue, and my cousin went a few houses down to play with this kid with a sparkling new Game Boy, this dude even had the nice plastic case and all these neat little accessories to go with it. It’s the little things you do in life that you think nobody will notice that will stir up the most hurt in people. I do not blame this kid, or blame anybody for it. I always thought that when somebody did something wrong, I would always forgive him or her and assume that they don’t know any better. We are all innocent children in a sense. My cousin and that kid would be sitting on the front porch, their house was very, very high class compared to the rest of the block, but as this was a high class neighborhood in Nassau County, and all those houses kind of look the same. This kid’s house was particularly bright, and their grass was almost neon-green like you see on those Mira-grow (sp?) commercials with their multi-million dollar lawns and what not. We sat on those steps and the kid was pounding away at his brand-new Game Boy, my cousin was watching and they were taking turns with a level.
I mustered up all the English I learned and tried to convince that kid to give me a turn. It was
“May Eye Playyy?”
…
“May Eye Payyy?”
…
“May Eye Payyy, peez?”
…
“May Eye Paayy, peeeeeeeeeeeeez?”
…

I was hurt, whether or not the kid knew it. I was even more hurt by my cousin not doing anything to help out. He was of my same ancestor and of the tartars and Genghis Khan and what not, my ancestors slaughtered thousands of innocent people (everybody is innocent friend) because they pissed on their wounds and rode horses and worked together and my prick cousin wouldn’t convince the kid to get me a round of his Game Boy. But not of me, He doesn’t know any better.
May you know it or not, the seemingly smallest details in life that people neglect can lead to the biggest turnouts in our lives. Who would know that you met your future wife because you were grabbing a slice of toast in a hurry on the way to work and forgot to zip up your messenger bag that fell a book at the right moment at the right place at the right time. You stayed that extra second and that cute girl bumped into you and you had a chat. But we know shit never seems as dreamy as that, things never hand themselves to you as easily as they tell you when you were growing up. And when you grew up to realize that you cannot become a rockstar or an astronaut, you curl up into a ball, or form a hard exoskeleton and turtle up. You hate your parents, you hate your peers, you hate your teachers, you hate people, you hate yourself, because it is much easier to blame somebody else for your pains than it is. Placement of guilt. You start excommunicating the people around you and as people get older they tend to be more reserved than when they were a child. You don’t talk to strangers anymore.

The little and tiniest detail of the Game Boy incident jumpstarted me into a teenage life of isolation and I always needed validation from others to be happy. A few months later and I am at the faithful P.S. 203 to continue my journey forward. My English was slightly improving, and perhaps I was not very strong myself, but friends were hard to come by when you cannot communicate to them very well aside from resorting to sign language. Hell, asking the teacher permission to take a shit was hard, and I had an accident once in first grade because of that. The cleaning lady was very happy with the results and commended me on Crap Artist reward number one. I was then the envy of all crap artists out there and…
…Anyway, it didn’t get better now that I spoke a few sentences in English. I honestly do not remember PS 203 that well other than that my parents said that the Principal was racist towards immigrants, I broke Ms. Yaffie’s damn Coyote skeleton, she saying that I crawl under the desks for fun when I was just picking up my pen and accusing me of being the worst kid that she ever had in her 35 years of teaching. Man, I thought, If that’s all it takes to tick her off, then American kids are too good for their own good, you gotta do some wrong sometimes dog.
I moved on to another public school, PS 162, and I remember being good at drawing the Titanic (Before the most expensive chick flick of all time was made, and hey I like chick flicks, sue me!) and my cousin’s house back in Long Island. The teacher commended me and so did the students, I felt like floating in the clouds and jumping into the cool, breezy ocean to swim with the dolphins, I felt like a bird flying in the Santa Monica shore. I didn’t need to be the coolest kid, I just needed to be accepted and now, somebody loves me! I am loved! Weeeeee!

I haven’t felt like that since I was a wee child and a time when everything went your way. It didn’t last long though, as there was a new thing in town. Every guy in the school was into basketball and being the best at basketball was more than enough to get you the attention and the popularity. This being basketball in public school, smoking, making out, yo-yo’s and those fucking little $20 dollar a pop Pokemon cards in middle school.
I forgot what was hot in high school, except for the rumors with whom was going out with whom and all. I was so socially inexperienced and so shy to talk to a girl previously that I the girls whom even threw themselves at me during High school I still didn’t get. I see it now; it goes beyond to any realm of life that you can imagine. Getting drunk and laying as many girls as you can in college for bragging rights, embodying the money, starter homes, Lexus, Corvettes, and the Royces, million dollar mansions with little Mexican servants, supermodel women to keep and marry and display as a trophy, 50 fucking inch plasma TVs, Jennifer Lopez, weight loss, Atkins, getting high, LSD, Weed, cutting your wrists the wrong way, jumping off the roof and splitting your skull on the pavement to get media attention for one day, DIY, life goes by, fuck it.
People will always try to fit in, spending their entire lives chasing a dream that they will all be accepted and loved properly because their parents denied them of that right when they weren’t going ga-ga anymore. It’s what to live for, in everything you do in a sense try to impress others, but JC says he is guilty and he is chasing the women and the money and the attention and that elusive dream, because JC is innocent and doesn’t know any better. Because we are all innocent once, we don’t know any better and will always be in a sense.

If you had a chance to go back during a time of your life, where would it be?

I remember my journey to Ocean Park for as long as I could recall. Ocean Park is actually Seaworld, Disneyland, and Wild Water Kingdom all rolled into one and it still kicks its butt all together! It is located in Hong Kong and is surrounded by majestic mountains of the surrounding new territories, huge sun-baked sea cliffs flanked by an infinite ocean into the horizon. I will go back one day, and ever we long to go back to those places we once went as a child and relive the memories, but we are afraid because when we get there it may not be the same. But I will go there and I will relive this one moment of my life, whether it changed or not. To be free as a child, everybody is once born free, free of life’s hardships and expectations, we children, they forgive us and say it’s cute because they know kids wouldn’t know any better. I am going to live the day again knowing better and see what that’s like. It’s time to go; I’ve packed my bags and left with nothing but a few shirts and my memories. I’m ready now, are you? Ready? Steady? Go…

***

The soft, gentle purr of the ferry almost drowned out the droning ocean. The water was clear enough to see the trillion grains of sand and all those little sea creatures crawling on the bottom. In the distance, the sun glared, but I could feel my own excitement jump out of my chest like a beehive. My mother’s hand was warm to the touch, and that’s when she offered me a soft drink. I nodded and didn’t take it, not another drink was about to delay this trip! She happily agreed and felt the thrill in my eyes.
And these people on the ferry, with all these children running around all these people were so happy when they expect a perfect day spent with their children to forget all the horrors of the office or their day jobs, and the world didn’t expect anything of them for that day except to enjoy themselves. They all had a big smile on their face, and when I saw that, I realized my own happiness as well. We were all infecting each other with this unified feeling. Nobody ever smiles, not on the bus, not at work, not at school, and if they do smile it is something made up for the crowd, it is rare for somebody to show that they are truly happy; it is a blessing for those who truly process to seed it out into the world and share it with others. The ferry was happiness.

We arrived on the island, I was the first one out of the boat, I was skipping and the fastest man alive and I was 3 feet tall wearing tennis shoes. Nobody was to be more excited than I was, I wouldn’t let it. Luckily, my parents caught up to me after a muttered breath, but they were as excited as I was, they could feel it in me and so they felt it too. My uncle wanted first thing to take me up on the first water ride of my life, so he grabbed me and I didn’t try to resist. And sooner than it happened, we were floating on a gentle, trickling stream surrounded by the legendary sea otters and an enchanted bamboo forest. We were floating, wordless and soaking in the moment.
The stream took us down for a while, and we greeted the great statues that must have been carved by my ancestors. We hit a sharp turn, the stream was speeding up, and my uncle held me tightly around my waist. I felt somebody bad was about to come up. We picked up speed and picked up speed and picked up some more. We were traveling so fast that we could be shot into the horizon, or outrun a bullet train. My uncle held me ever so tight, he was to be there when we fell and was to keep me safe from the unexpected and I felt all like my throat slipped into my belly. I didn’t scream, I didn’t expect the fall but my uncle did, he probably took many rides like this in his life. I got off and said I didn’t like it, it didn’t feel good, but I had a strange resonance in the back of my head to go on it again, and so I asked them if I could get on again, they said they thought I didn’t like it, I said I liked it, but they said we were to go on another ride just like that one soon. The ride was life.

I went on a few more rides and my uncle asked me if I’ll like to ride this one, and I said no, it was enough for me that day. We wanted ice cream. We waited in the long line to get ice cream, and we heard a commotion somewhere down there. I didn’t know what they were arguing about, and I still don’t know what they were arguing about, but I don’t think it would be more important than us eating ice cream. I saw, they were two adults, a lady and another louder lady. The kids patiently stood at them watching, no one muttered a word but they screamed it. Adults act worst than kids at times, would they serious fight over the ice cream? We were all to get ice cream anyways, It’s hard to know what true maturity is sometimes, when even adults fight, and its even harder to find one who truly acts grown up.
And after the ice cream, when the evening breeze washed across my face to a crimson sunset, my parents took me to ride the tram. The tram was suspended by a single line from hundreds of feet above the ocean below. The flightless seagull that I am. I look at the sunset and the sparkling ocean from the floating tram and spread my wings, the gales guide us, we will never be quite free as the birds but it was an honor to be one for a while. It was great to feel weightless and floating for just a few moments, we let go. I looked at my mom, my dad; they had the softest smile on their faces, because they were free too, for this one very moment of their lives. And how they long to just become a seagull forever, people tell them how grown-ups should perform and act, how other adults expect a certain thing from you; they were kids too in a sense. And today, we are all floating and flying into the sunset with me, they didn’t have to worry anymore. We are all innocent, and we will always be children. Today I will keep them safe, I will watch over them. And together, we shall fly forever.

***