Austin Nights

dwell on the structure of this story, but I do want to say the I you are reading right now is the writer of this memory, or at least most of it.

  But this isn’t a journal. It’s a memory meant to entertain.

  Frida Kahlo painted from her life in the same way I write from mine. The richest aspect of her life was her life. Frida painted from what she experienced firsthand:

  I paint myself because I am so often alone and because I am the subject I know best.

  9

  The balcony is a nice place to sit and talk, especially when you’re drinking bananas, mango, apple, and tangelos soaked and cooled overnight in Italian Pinot Grigio.

  I’m telling Bridget about the children’s book I read at the library about Steve Jobs. Last week I learned about Fidel Castro, and this week I learned about Steve Jobs.

  For a long time I’ve stayed away from biographies. The last biography I sat down with and learned from was Bo Knows by the great crossover athlete, Bo Jackson. But biographies can unintentionally keep people low, not by persuading them they aren’t good enough to even pick an apple off a tree, but by making people enamored, even blinded by the unparalleled successes of these achievers, and all of a sudden it’s enough that these people like you and me accomplished so much. All of a sudden, their mind-blowing life moves you straight into complacency, however enlightened you may be, you’re just complacent: happy enough with everything you can let things ride like they are. That’s my problem with biographies. The fantastic story of another person’s life can suddenly become comfortably stifling.

  It’s kind of how I feel after I walk out of a really good movie. Every really good movie makes me feel the same way. Somewhere near the beginning, I want to stand up and leave and create a piece of art. I feel like I can do it, all I have to do is start writing.

  But, invariably, I stay and watch the entire movie because it is a really good movie. I stay in my seat and keep my eyes focused and follow the dialogue all the way till the very end. Then, I walk out and feel totally happy. The inexorable itch to create isn’t there anymore. In its place there’s a complacent man: comfortably stifled and eager to relate what I just watched rather than create something of my own.

  Watching really good movies, for me, is like reading about the giant achievers, or the makers of our history. I read about these giant achievers, these history makers, and I am totally content by the very end. Their story, somewhere near the beginning, makes me feel optimistic, like I can do it. I can be Michael Davidson, the writer. I can put the book down and reach the ranks of the great achievers.

  But, invariably, I read the entire book. Follow it closely word for word until the very end, and then I’m satisfied with what I’ve done. I’ve learned about Fidel Castro, or I’ve learned about Steve Jobs, or Bo Jackson, or Larry McMurtry of Archer County.

  I not only learned, but I also felt really good doing it. Their stories are so spectacular, so against-the-odds, simply reading them puts me in a state of beatific awe, or, better yet, grace, and what’s even better: I can relate their stories to other people and experience grace again.

  It’s a beautiful and strange thing, being able to identify with someone so closely they make you feel something real, like Making Dreams Come True, like having a vision and carrying it through to completion, because they’ve achieved everything and some.

  But you haven’t done a damn thing except read a biography.

  We’re sitting on our new balcony in Austin, Bridget and I, sipping pinot-soaked fresh mango, and I become inspired by the illustrious story of another person who doesn’t know me and probably wouldn’t give me a second of his time if I were to tell him my lackluster story. This doesn’t keep me from trying my best to infect Bridget with my complacent admiration for Mister Think Different.

  Steve Jobs travels to India, seeks gurus, lives in ashrams, becomes green, and he has no idea what he wants to do. That’s why he’s in India, to figure some shit out. It occurs to him, while witnessing serious poverty, Thomas Edison did more for people than any guru.

  Steve Jobs has an epiphany, and he returns to Silicon Valley, back in the days when it had orchards, and starts Apple. Steve Jobs is a history maker. He made history doing exactly what he envisioned when he left India: using electricity to improve quality of life worldwide.

  There. Grace.

  3

  At 2AM, Bridget is bleary eyed and ready to give the steering wheel to me. While she drove through Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi, I managed to catch a couple hours of shuteye, somehow, and feel up to the challenge of driving through the deep hours of the night.

  Still, it seems prudent to buy caffeine pills. I figure any gas station will carry them in stock, but the first clerk I ask in a Louisiana Kangaroo Express tells me if they’re not on the shelf with the other pills, they don’t have them.

  I try a different Kangaroo Express, on the north side of I-10.

  I lock my lover inside the Chevy’s cab. She gazes at me through her bloodshot eyes, helpless and delirious, and I walk toward the automatic doors.

  A man behind the counter is busy being busy at 2AM. He thumbs through pages on a cheap clipboard. I can’t understand his business.

  “Already 277 customers,” he says to me without looking up from his pages, “and it’s only Thursday night. We’re busy.”

  He nods his head, then he shakes his head: a man in Louisiana in disagreement and agreement with himself.

  I ask if he has any caffeine pills. He says he took two tonight.

  “I’m jittery,” he says, “I feel great right now, completely on top of things, wired.” He nods his head. “But when I come down,” he says, “I’m going to crash like a 747.” He shakes his head and makes the sound of a falling airplane.

  I ask what pills he took. He hands me a four-pill package from the back wall. Each pill is colored like a wasp stinger. I read the ingredients and see Yellow 5, a synthetic food coloring phased out in the UK for its adverse health effects.

  “You have anything else?” I ask, returning the stingers.

  “Yeah,” he says, “we have pure ephedrine, if you can believe that, but it’s expensive.”

  I wonder if he’s trying to peddle drugs to late night drivers. A little speed might do me good. At the very least, it’ll keep me from taking micro naps and driving on the soft shoulder.

  “How much is expensive?”

  “Four bucks for four pills,” he says. Then he does the math, “Buck a pill.”

  “That’s reasonable.”

  Back in the car, Bridget is still bleary eyed from eleven hours straight of interstate. She took her concentration to the limits, and now she’s feeling the consequences.

  “I just tripped,” she says.

  “What do you mean?” I ask, curious about her usage of the word tripped.

  “I just rested my head against this pillow and stared at the gas station. It felt like I was rushing forward, and the windshield wobbled.”

  “Wobbled?”

  “You know, it moved like one of those mirrors in a fun house, all wavy, and all I saw was that clerk nodding and shaking his head. What’s wrong with him?”

  “Who?” I ask, combing her reddish gold hair off her temple. “Oh, he’s all hopped up on Yellow 5.”

  Bridget wants to laugh, but there’s only a snort left in her.

  I lean over to kiss the crown of her head. Then I pop ephedrine into my mouth, jiggle the tiny pill on the flat of my tongue to feel its weight, and swallow down with some fresh orange juice.

  “Off we go,” I announce.

  I turn the engine over, put the transmission in drive, and let the reflective green sign take me to the 1-10 West ramp. I merge onto the two-lane interstate. A semi flashes its taillights on and off twice.

  I manually tune in a station on the FM dial and read the odometer. Bridget drove her half. It’s my turn to drive the rest.

  2

  We take the camera out for a night of walking and photos. North on Congress
Ave, there’s a pink rosebush outside a small convenient store with a bevy of beer and wine to choose from, an inebriant for everyone, truly democratic.

  But it’s the pink rosebush that makes me stop and try out our new camera.

  Experimenting with shutter speeds satisfies my compulsion to control the things around me. I wouldn’t call myself a Nazi, but I do like to shape reality in subtle ways, like adjusting shutter speeds, or making Honeyed Cat diurnal.

  “Can I take a photo of you smelling that rose?” I ask Bridget.

  “Which one?”

  “The biggest.”

  I stabilize the camera on the mini-tripod, set it to maximum shutter speed, and snap three photos. Bridget looks paranormal, a visitor from elsewhere filling her senses with foreign stimuli.

  How can we resist?

  “Want to buy a road soda for our walk?” suggests Bridget.

  “Yes,” I say. I say, “I’d like that.”

  Inside, the sterile glow of fluorescents complements my buzz, courtesy of Shaggy. 1.5 pulls suffice. I become serious, or at least as serious as a little man from the beach can be under very specific circumstances. Beautiful Bridget, on the other hand, is buoyant as she glides to the back of the store and returns with an IPA we’ve had once before.

  Although I’m tempted to follow suit, as I, too, am partial to a big beer of IPA, my past comes up for air and reminds me of the good-fun that comes with 24 ounces of Steel Reserve.

  It has been years since I’ve experienced a 24-ounce can. Miami Beach only carries a stock of twelve-