Excerpt No. 3

Thanks to everyone who's been following along with these excerpts. I'm going to be posting new ones every Wednesday. All comments and feedback are appreciated. Thanks.

Neither dishwasher nor dishmaker, our dear protagonist did not understand his place in the human ecosystem of New York City. And in his year at shithole, he had not gained any greater insight into his puzzle. What was so important about these unceasing numbers? he all too frequently asked himself. Why do I care that subject 196-03-9943 has blood in his stool? I don’t send a note to his doctor. I do not inform my superior of the possibility of a hematochezia epidemic. It merely stands there as written, on record. Blood in the stool—April 18^th, 2024. 

There was no satisfaction in this useless invasion of privacy, our puzzled and pained protagonist continued to ponder. Fuck it, our now profane protagonist ended the discussion. 

Finally settled and ready to begin his day’s work, he was once again, immediately and inconsiderately interrupted. It was Danny coming in over the vid-com: 

“Hey Jerry, did you see what the new secretary was wearing today?”

“No, I didn’t. And why do you bother asking me on the vid-com, we’re right next to each other.” He surveyed the adjacent cubicle but found it empty. 

“Dude, I’m on the can. They installed them last week.” 

“Jesus, man.” 

“I know, it’s awesome, right?” 

“No. That’s disgusting. Why on earth would we ever need a vid-com system in the restrooms?” 

“Well I suppose it’s to keep jockeys like you from wasting half a day of work passing last night’s steak dinner.” 

“Charming. And, you know, I’d get a lot more work done if you weren’t pestering me constantly.” 

“Alright, alright! Take it easy. No need get worked up over a couple of toilet-coms. You know, you have to work on your stress levels. Besides, your boss is right behind you.” 

“Mr Blauer, I see we’re off to a productive start this fine morning. Remember your quarterly reports are due next week, and I want them pristine. No more mistakes. You could probably avoid such egregious oversights if you weren’t constantly engaged in locker room antics with your esteemed colleague, Mr Martinez.” 

“Yes sir,” muttered Mr Blauer apologetically, “And if I might add, I was just beginning my work before I was interrupted, and I was in the process of ending the conversation as soon as I could.” 

“Well I hope you maintain such vigilance in the future.” Satisfied, but still lightly annoyed, Blauer’s superior vacated the cubicle in favor of his own corner window office. Mr Blauer in turn began his day’s work at a furious pace, and by some miracle of god or the Secretary of Human Health, Hygiene and Sanitation Services, our diligent protagonist worked until lunch without a single interruption from Danny or his own conflicted, inner dialogue, asking such immediately pertinent questions like, Who am I? What am I doing here? or Am I a dishwasher or a dishmaker?

 Cheers,

The Flying Dutchman.

Excerpt NUMMER ZWEI!

Alright, so I guess it's time for a second excerpt. Thanks to Ashleigh, Vieshnavi and Orysia for your feeback so far. The first excerpt was a very brief sampling, so I thought I'd put a little bit more out there this time.

Having reached the tenth floor and arrived at their respective, adjacent cubicles, Danny continued, “I mean it dude, Israeli agents in cahoots with America are systematically sabotaging Arab Union factories.” 

“Man that’s Old World shit. Israel has been at peace with the Arab Union for ten years. There’s no more sabotage or espionage.”

“That’s just what we’re supposed to think.” 

Though in a better mood induced from caffeine and the positive psychological association of the taste of coffee, our Jerry had to cut this enlightened conversation short, “Well man, I got a lot of shit to do today. We can continue this at lunch.” 

“Dude, you don’t work.” 

“Yeah, yeah. Fuck off.” 

Now, while the consummate work of shithole was patriotic and edifying, our benevolent protagonist could claim neither of these adjectives for his work. Our Jerry was merely a datajockey, as they referred to those in his line of work. The Triple H maintained a fascinating stream of data for nearly every resident in the city and state of New York. Equally impressive facilities collected data for every major metropolitan area in the US. The system remained federated for the time being; they were not collecting information on a national scale yet. 

Mr Blauer’s measly job was handling a negligible percentage of this data. A pebble amongst this mountain. He observed, analyzed, organized and never editorialized this constant stream. His life was a blur of tables and spreadsheets, numbers and graphs. 

Now, you may be inquiring as to the nature of these magnificent numbers around which our beloved protagonist’s life revolves. Well it is really quite simple. These numbers are everything. 

The 2021 Act of Human Health, Hygiene and Sanitation Services not only created the department of the same name, but also set into motion the directive for which these earnest datajockeys work. This act installed so-called Health and Wellness Monitors in every urban and suburban household in America (the rural HWMs came later), simultaneously improving the health of the country and creating thousands, no millions, of jobs. 

These splendid devices collected samples daily. Blood samples. Stool samples. Urine samples. Air. Hair. Skin. Fingernails. Sweat. Tears. Anything. Everything. 

Mr Blauer certainly did not dream of being a datajockey his whole life—quite the contrary in fact. Jerry grew up in a fairly musical family. Those who were not musicians nonetheless had musical inclinations. He was always surrounded by music, and at a relatively young age he became musically active, beginning piano lessons at five and guitar at nine. The skill did not immediately come easy to him as it did so many of his family, but he worked hard and became respectable at both instruments, though his love was for guitar. In and out of bands from the age of thirteen he endlessly imagined he could someday make a living off music. A common dream with uncommon satisfaction. 

Until his unfortunate employment at shithole a year ago today, our beloved Jerry was even doing quite well for a musician. Yes, it is true, he brought in roughly 51% of his earnings from a locally owned, independent bookstore, a fast-dying trade itself, he did indeed make money from performing his music. He still hopped from band to band, a so-called hired gun, but it was money, and it was music. It made him happy. At least relatively so. He still wrote his own music on the side. And this was enough to keep his inner creative turmoil busy. 

But life’s little, quaint responsibilities have a way of squelching every artist’s desires. For Jerry this came in the form of a child. Little darling Barrett Dylan. What a ghastly and pretentious name. The instant you hear such a name you know the parents are so up their own ass with artsy-fucking-fartsy bullshit….I’m sorry. Your honest narrator will try to refrain from injecting his own judgments into the life and decisions of our dear protagonist. Nonetheless, devoted family man that he wished to become, Jerry felt it necessary to join the ranks of the hapless nine-to-fivers he detested. He knew his child and dear wife needed something steady and stable. Steadiness and stability: the death knell of any artist’s career. Art cannot be steady and stable! The very definition forbids it. 

But all artists must grow up some day. His wife’s uncle just happened to be a sector head at the recently created Department of Human Health, Hygiene and Sanitation Services. And they were looking for datajockeys. What luck! Though of course, the uncle did not use the term datajockey, but rather the more enticing health statistics analyst. Yes, it is not terribly more enticing than datajockey, but it certainly sounds more important. 

Now—of course—all jobs, from the most menial to the most illustrious, are important in their own way. As all creatures and beasts serve a function in each ecosystem, all careers are necessary for the function of society. Insects are vile creatures. They pester, and they do not invite the poet’s inspired verses like a soaring eagle or a majestic tiger command. No, they merely eat away at the decay and filth of putrescent life. Biology assigns these tasks to each order of life. Likewise human life is an ecosystem with its own modes of putrefaction, real or figurative, which requires the low rungs of society, the nobodies, the losers. Therefore the winners know they need the losers and make it their civic duty to keep them down and out. If there were no garbagemen the city would pile high with waste. If there were no dishwashers, mountains of disposed dinnerware would be as ubiquitous a sight as cracked concrete—though the business of manufacturing such dinnerware would immediately become very profitable. 

….I digress. Forgive me for my spurt of useless babble. 

Cheers,

The Flying Dutchman.

First excerpt

As I posted the other day, I am in the process of writing a short-story/novella, and I did get one request for a short excerpt, so I will oblige. So Vieshnavi, this is for you, haha.

Here you have the first page and a half or so:

One year, thought Jerry Blauer as he exited the subway car and walked toward the office building. One year in this shithole. Ten years ago this was not where he wanted to be, shut in, day after day in the same cubicle. He crossed the street, after waiting for the little white man to give the ok, and entered the lobby of 75 West 59^th street, the Department of Human Health, Hygiene and Sanitation Services, referred to in documents as DeptHHHSS, by the media as the triple H, by those in public who frequented it simply as the department, and by our beloved protagonist and his equally well-tempered co-workers as shithole.

The operations of shithole were simple: keep the public safe from its own goddamn disgusting behaviors. Or more tactfully put in its manifesto and statement of purpose: The Department of Human Health, Hygiene and Sanitation Services defends the public good and the common order of civilization by maintaining the cleanliness of our cities and our bodies alike, enforcing and maintaining a standard of living by which all may enjoy the beauty of our collective lives.

One year in this shithole, continued Jerry’s inner soliloquy. At least it’s a paycheck. It keeps my wife happy. It pays for diapers. It pays for formula, for babysitters, for cribs, and so on continued the rationalization for his daily sacrifice to shithole, all the while trying to keep silent his true feelings on the matter. Stupid kid ruined my life; now, now, I love that kid, he makes me happy. Makes me smile. But look what it drove me too. If only he’d come two years later or something. Then it would have been alright.

He entered the elevator and selected the tenth floor.

His inner soliloquy, now becoming more akin to an inner dialogue, was cut short—though to be honest he was not reaching any greater conclusion any time soon—by Danny Martinez, his co-worker and only friend at shithole. Danny was small, underweight and generally rat-like in appearance. He claimed a stature of 5’6”, but his own body and confidence (or rather a distinct lack of it) betrayed him. Our beloved protagonist approximated his height at a less substantial 5’5”.

“Dude, did you see the news last night?”

“No.”

“Dude. Major shit’s going down.”

“I don’t care.”

“No man, listen. They’re saying that a natural disaster knocked out the Arab Union’s solar fields in Medina.”

“So fuckin what.”

“It wasn’t no wind storm, man. It was Israeli agents. It’s just so obvious.”

“Does it affect my paycheck?”

“Well, no….Obviously not, man, in the, uh, short term sense….”

“Well then at least wait till I finish my coffee before you barrage me with this babble.”

You see, the thing to realize about our friend, Danny Martinez, is that for him, no official story was satisfactory. There are all sorts of skeptics and conspiracy theorists. There are those, who bathe themselves in stories of extra-terrestrials and UFOs. There are those, who breathe in the air of black ops and back door deals of world powers. There are those, who when confronted with news stories of major world catastrophes, accept all accounts other than the official statements of the major parties involved. Danny Martinez was all of these sorts. Jerry Blauer was none of them. It’s not as if he readily accepted all official storytelling of the world order, but rather that he did not have the time. Your story, his story, their story. Didn’t matter. He didn’t believe any of it, and that didn’t particularly bother him. The world was full liars and exploiters on all sides, and as long as they refrained from fucking with him explicitly, he really didn’t have the effort to care.

Danny had perhaps a little too much effort to expend. But that was all well and good. To each his own. It didn’t bother our dear protagonist so long as he had his morning coffee. Danny’s stories entertained him. True or not.

Hope you enjoy. Any feedback, kind or not, is appreciated ;)