All of the Things That Go to Make Heaven and Earth*
…are, curiously enough, here, in Beachtown, Carolina.
This was what I was thinking last night, driving down the town’s ugliest strip, all dotted with its car dealerships, strip clubs, Carrabas and Hooters and gas stations—twice.
My friend had this idea for all of us to go ice skating last night, and reserved a time at the town’s one rink before any of us had every been there. And so last night, he and I are driving down this town’s Strip of Ugly looking for the place, and marveling at all the headlights around us, all the radios blaring their different stations. Who were are all these people, what were they doing here and where were they going, in this off-season?
And another mile and another and still, no rink. And before we know it, we’re on the freaking *highway* out of Beachtown, without an exit for miles. And so had to loop back around again and ten minutes later were spat back onto the Strip of Ugly, again, laughing hard at all of this. The invisible ice rink, the poor sign situation here in Beachtown and the heinousness of our surroundings. A strip resembling exactly the Gawdawful-Fest that is Piedmont Avenue in Atlanta, or the seediest side of the strip in Myrtle Beach: obscene with its exhaust backlit by bright fluorescence and dirty movie stores and just as weirdly magnetic and electric with nocturnal restlessness. I hate these streets of America and I am drawn to them, at least to driving through them, protected by metal and music and chrome, and maybe a nice beer buzz.
And here, amazed by the way which all this gives way so fast, to empty. To swampland, a different mode, entirely. Or, if you make a different turn, to the ocean. Our bright little self-destructive island of Us Us Us trying so hard to sing so loud. It’s like flying over Las Vegas at night. The desert is still the blackest. Here on the edge of the continent we call continent, the stars are still the brightest.
We found the rink. Skating: fun, and also made me think of futility, around and around that rink. The word rink. Maybe it was the beer, again, but I never fell, even though I think I’ve been skating three or four times, maybe, ever. And I felt more graceful and alone and untouchable than I had in a long time. We went in a group, but there’s always that solitude to skating; you group up and break off; you shout at one another over the terrible pop music, but mostly, you’re by yourself, watching the ice bump along under you, and you think about this flying, and you think about this solitude and circling, circling back to the same place. It just is what it is.
I came back home after skating and found Carmelita had graduated to Queen of the Night at the full-blown bash our earlier small cookout had exploded into. Early Who was blowing the living room speakers ragged and new people populated our kitchen and looked at me like I was strange when I came in. “You’re home!” Carm’ shouted at me, holding her Pabst/Miller/Yuengling aloft. “Didn’t you leave, like, ten minutes ago?”
I fell into conversation, into more beer, into trying to explain the politics of the skating rink to an endearingly smashed Carmelita, whose high spirits translated into her hitting me, hard, again and again--
Alice: So, it was fun, but—
Carmelita (interrupting, whapping Alice on the shoulder-blade and doubling over with laughter): Oh, Alishhh. C’moutside.
Some girl whom we all realized to be a waitress at a town breakfast joint had taken a mug of mine and drawn all over it in blue Sharpie and then insisted to me it was Dry Erase. I tried to scrub it off in the bathroom, but failed. I opened another beer. We all talked and talked. We played a lopsided version of Tammy Faye Cornhole, and everyone left by 11:30 or so, leaving Carmelita and me to eat a couple hotdogs and ibuprofen before staggering off to bed. I was grateful for this end, Henshaw, for this homecoming after the restlessness of the town strip and the rink. It was one of those nights of weird longing and I was grateful for this camaraderie, for the forms it took: the inebriated, bruise-rendering physical affection of my roommate, thumping me again, hard, on the back.
(*name of song by The New Pornographers on their weird, meandering album Challengers that only now&just now, am I beginning to listen to nonstop and nonstop. Okay, Litza; you win.)
…are, curiously enough, here, in Beachtown, Carolina.
This was what I was thinking last night, driving down the town’s ugliest strip, all dotted with its car dealerships, strip clubs, Carrabas and Hooters and gas stations—twice.
My friend had this idea for all of us to go ice skating last night, and reserved a time at the town’s one rink before any of us had every been there. And so last night, he and I are driving down this town’s Strip of Ugly looking for the place, and marveling at all the headlights around us, all the radios blaring their different stations. Who were are all these people, what were they doing here and where were they going, in this off-season?
And another mile and another and still, no rink. And before we know it, we’re on the freaking *highway* out of Beachtown, without an exit for miles. And so had to loop back around again and ten minutes later were spat back onto the Strip of Ugly, again, laughing hard at all of this. The invisible ice rink, the poor sign situation here in Beachtown and the heinousness of our surroundings. A strip resembling exactly the Gawdawful-Fest that is Piedmont Avenue in Atlanta, or the seediest side of the strip in Myrtle Beach: obscene with its exhaust backlit by bright fluorescence and dirty movie stores and just as weirdly magnetic and electric with nocturnal restlessness. I hate these streets of America and I am drawn to them, at least to driving through them, protected by metal and music and chrome, and maybe a nice beer buzz.
And here, amazed by the way which all this gives way so fast, to empty. To swampland, a different mode, entirely. Or, if you make a different turn, to the ocean. Our bright little self-destructive island of Us Us Us trying so hard to sing so loud. It’s like flying over Las Vegas at night. The desert is still the blackest. Here on the edge of the continent we call continent, the stars are still the brightest.
We found the rink. Skating: fun, and also made me think of futility, around and around that rink. The word rink. Maybe it was the beer, again, but I never fell, even though I think I’ve been skating three or four times, maybe, ever. And I felt more graceful and alone and untouchable than I had in a long time. We went in a group, but there’s always that solitude to skating; you group up and break off; you shout at one another over the terrible pop music, but mostly, you’re by yourself, watching the ice bump along under you, and you think about this flying, and you think about this solitude and circling, circling back to the same place. It just is what it is.
I came back home after skating and found Carmelita had graduated to Queen of the Night at the full-blown bash our earlier small cookout had exploded into. Early Who was blowing the living room speakers ragged and new people populated our kitchen and looked at me like I was strange when I came in. “You’re home!” Carm’ shouted at me, holding her Pabst/Miller/Yuengling aloft. “Didn’t you leave, like, ten minutes ago?”
I fell into conversation, into more beer, into trying to explain the politics of the skating rink to an endearingly smashed Carmelita, whose high spirits translated into her hitting me, hard, again and again--
Alice: So, it was fun, but—
Carmelita (interrupting, whapping Alice on the shoulder-blade and doubling over with laughter): Oh, Alishhh. C’moutside.
Some girl whom we all realized to be a waitress at a town breakfast joint had taken a mug of mine and drawn all over it in blue Sharpie and then insisted to me it was Dry Erase. I tried to scrub it off in the bathroom, but failed. I opened another beer. We all talked and talked. We played a lopsided version of Tammy Faye Cornhole, and everyone left by 11:30 or so, leaving Carmelita and me to eat a couple hotdogs and ibuprofen before staggering off to bed. I was grateful for this end, Henshaw, for this homecoming after the restlessness of the town strip and the rink. It was one of those nights of weird longing and I was grateful for this camaraderie, for the forms it took: the inebriated, bruise-rendering physical affection of my roommate, thumping me again, hard, on the back.
(*name of song by The New Pornographers on their weird, meandering album Challengers that only now&just now, am I beginning to listen to nonstop and nonstop. Okay, Litza; you win.)
posted by Alice at 8:08 PM
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