[a short]Film Noir soliloquy: of Encrypted Notes to Celf & statistical anomalies

 

it occurs to me as I hear the chords play.... I think of this now as I write this....

it is later when I find myself staring out the window .... 

watch, like a synchronized ballet.... reflection like mirror in the water.... reversed

the codes.... 

backward 

numbers, 

backward 

letters....

reflection 

He has figured me out.... we knew that though, didn’t we? ....well, no, there are still a few loose canons out there he doesn’t know about..... but.... still.... I suppose them being safely away in Sweden made me stop thinking about that old safe and drum table ....

I’ve been hiding in the mountains .... and closing out the world to retreat from society hoping to find inner peace through monk like meditations vomited into prose to catalogue my mysterious journey all spoken in code through symbolic meaning 

so.... because he broke one code does that mean I am defeated? It is just one code, after all and he had already, I just chose to ignore it. I mean, without the confirmation of opening it.... well, it was all hypothesis ....you know? Don’t confirm or deny ....

but now he has the safe and table. But where has he put it? Did he ship it here? 

has he already opened it and not said? ....what is in that safe anyway? 

Electra’s dictionary; notes and stranger notes (jm noir chronicles)

 

In any culture it seems it is our stories that define us. The bards and their harps, the folklore, the ancient myths and ....stories told in sand ....sometimes around a fire 

*****

Jörn has spent months rewriting certain parts of the music. I like to watch him when he is deep at his work. I get the best studies of his expressions in the spot that I watch from above by the second floor gallery sometimes with sketch pad, sometimes with phone, pressing play where closeups are a useful tool, as well as my noir footage 

today as I watch him he throws his pencil down from the music paper .... 

he goes from notes to keys as he plays and then he records this in notes.... still in his running clothes, he had returned from this morning’s run with a surge of music as soon as he sat down; not even stopping to drink water nor to shower; still at it an hour later ....he is caught in this one part 

It is the part of the opera that Jörn has described to me. it is across from a watering spot where he has brought a horse he purchased with the sale of some swords when he first sees her

the part when the dove appears to him and then magically it turns into her

but the fear of him startles her and she is speechless with fright

he bends over the water and makes a ripple that reaches her.... and then she bends to reply, doing this back to him as they watch each other across the water

But she has come there to fill a jug with water to bring back to her father at the market place stall where her father is selling herbs and healing the sick so she then returns to her task. He follows her to the marketplace 

by now I have gone down to the kitchen to cut up an apple and quietly observe him from the butcher block table I chop the apple on. 

His spending more time around has me wondering if this has as much to do with the repossessions of the safe and twin table and the association of Nivek Retnuh or ....maybe it is just the opera after all? 

I study him thoughtfully.... then notice his hair has also gotten long ....

the ends need a trim and so impulsively I reach for the gardening shears.... but as I watch, now suddenly in a violent motion he tears the music paper out of the notebook, balls it into a crumple and then savagely throws it like a javelin with some Swedish curse

I go over to the window where he’s thrown it to and pick it up unfolding it

“It’s shit, toss it in the fireplace,” he waves with a sweeping angry gesture and points to the fireplace with a pissed-off commanding glance at me 

“Hmmm....” I look it over as if I can actually read the symbols dancing about my dyslexic haze, still I pretend as I like to collect his scrawls and then walk over and put the crumpled sheet down on the piano surface and say, “hold still!”

“What are you doing with those?” Jörn glares at the gardening shears with a horrified look 

“Don’t move!” and climb on him to stop him from moving 

“I wish you wouldn’t walk around holding those that way,” and grabs for it

“No, really, hold still,” I take out the tie, “you can trust me, I’ve been doing this for years—“

“Not to me!” he protests even as I get the part that was bothering me in a clean cut.... which he hears and suddenly decides to stay still as he says under his breath, “should I point out that I am already feeling slightly bitchie?” and the humor of his tone is meant as a warning 

“Two seconds and it will be over,” I say and swing around, getting off. 

Impressed the shears are freshly sharpened. The neat flutters fall down like little feathers 

“I really don’t recall making this appointment, never mind, it’s getting all over the floor, duva, can you stop now?”

“The floor is slate, not Persian carpet .... you should let me do this for you, this is going to look so much better than who ever it is usually does it—no, don’t move, this part is tricky—“ as having worked around him, am back to the front, getting back on 

“Tricky—“ he repeats in a hiss under his breath ....after a moment, “will be if you ever get away with it if I don’t agree with your artistic vision.”

“There. Fixed,” I let him go and get off as to my amazement the shears made short work of it; a quick glance over, then touching the fresh ends to watch how they fall in a more natural angle that sharpens his bone structure—go get the broom, “you can look now....”

which he wastes no time in doing. He is by the entrance hallway mirror in a few strides as I’m sweeping up the hair dust into the bin and walk by him to throw it away

He’s still at the mirror inspecting himself with an odd, slightly indignant twitch in my direction as I notice him straighten up and look himself over thoughtfully but still with a slightly dubious expression as he brushes imaginary hair off his shirt 

And as I go to the sink I watch him 

I think of the wave in the water ....

    then see it as if in front of me

I get a sick feeling, standing there. But it is not so much sick as it is the kind of motion sickness.... this only happens when ....those things which happen and have happened that I never write much about as they are quite strange; I get a strange feeling. That kind

I consider this.... water .... the water hole .... reflection in the water and watch it like a movie of daylight sky .... reflects ....like a mirror on the water .... watch it 

I don’t even notice he is back at the piano with new enthusiasm .... suddenly a wild burst of vigor which seems to nearly explode from his fingers as he pounds madly the keys ....his hair in the light hypnotizes me, like the sand on the beach on one of those stops ....those nights under the bright stars with their legends and stories 

Suddenly he bursts through my thoughts and says,

“come here!” like some kind of order —I want to call him Henry the eighth or something but stop myself because —I see that wildness in his eyes ....and it is threatening to erupt ....and just go

he indicates the bench hastily between slamming the chords with one hand still in pace and I sit there fast where he has made a quick place for me. He pulls me inside his arms and plays over me,

“I want you to play this exactly this way!!” he nearly shouts this

I watch his fingers pushing down over mine, he places them and we play it together a few times. Then he says he will do something around me but to keep doing these chords as he showed me 

I get confused the first two times and apologize when he gets irritated but he insists and we do it again and after the fourth time I hear .... what he was trying to do 

with the layers of sounds; the first set is one, the other reflection .... reversed notes .... then played back and the strange blending sound made together ....then the left hand.... 

Like a chill ....I feel something seem to touch the top of my spine 

Defining more of the path of the legend (reflections in parallel)

“....I mean, my writing that I put in my blog is a kind of mirror to these more personal thoughts that I record here. The public one I am less likely to delete as the public one protects me in anonymity with its guise of fiction. I can use allegory to support those things that allow me to take another breath and suppose in the strength of the universe some balm of humane understanding as if what I say actually matters, as if my words fall upon some mind out there who may connect with just one tiny aspect to understand.... even just to fool myself, really; it lets me breathe at least another breath.... The purpose is the same though, both in the public and private ones. It is about the search for why I am here; the search for meaning —why anyone is here, I guess, as well

I mean, not everyone is intended for greatness or fame or notoriety. We may argue that some lives are pointless and many attest that all lives matter; all are special, etc, etc

I guess I am not fully convinced; I question this, especially in relation to myself. 

So let us then say that all lives are necessary and all are special even if they are not intended for greatness but to be that cog in the machine .... (the cow, the pig, the chicken, the fish, the ant, the oak tree?)

So what does that mean to me? And what does that mean to my project? 

Does it stop after my trilogy is complete? What does the trilogy signify in relation to what it intends to define?

....I mean, ‘Beth who is what’ was another exploration which reflected a similar diary at the time .... that I suppose I outgrew as that Bran who stood for someone at the time and, like that life ....fell away ....was part of why it did because —did I define that “What” I was searching to find? That ‘bastard “What” that I am’— having now learned to be resigned in: ‘whatever, this is me; take it or leave it’

Has it even dawned on me—(we become our names)Jung and his archetypes and synchronicities .... no, I still search and my medium seems to be whatever my mood of expression happens to require, and I don’t really think it has ever been my choice, just my mission or cog in the wheel which forces these words, these paintings, these thoughts that grips the hand to grab the brush or the pencil or keyboard .... it won’t shut up.... I start to feel that the trilogy is only the introduction to .... 

where it is telling the legend to follow.... but I have not yet reached that Paradiso; the pinnacle of what that high path has been pulling this level of levels along so, really, how can I yet know where it leads?”

(as I sometimes do keep a private journal, I’m not nearly as faithful to it as ‘the dictionary’ as it has twice been my history to have it discovered and used against me; this is why hiding my meanings in fiction is much more reliable)

Screen time with Josef

 

....I am feeling quite foolish and also quite at something of a loss .... as I am staring at the monitor and hearing a disembodied voice in excited chatter

I have taken the “call” in the kitchen where Jörn set it up before taking off for one of his jogging meetings and leaving me in at a disadvantage wondering what I’m doing 

“We have been busy with keeping up with regulations,” Josef says vaguely, “as nobody quite understands —but it’s rather serious here at the moment ....so I am sorry I have taken longer for our chat,” he is saying as he seems to be moving around as he says this

but hazards of ADHD, I don’t comprehend quite what I’m looking at; there seems to be too much going on and adding to the oddity, I am using Jörn’s laptop that normally, he never lets me near. Besides that —I avoid doing this kind of thing 

and it seems Josef has walked away from his side of the camera.... and find ....I can’t understand what’s going on—

and no idea what or —why ? ....but what I am looking at?

Never mind the point, where exactly is this? But, really, I feel like I want to indulge him because it seems, in a funny way, rather sweet, isn’t it? I mean, I have missed him being around.  And he really seems so intent on showing me something

“Well, I can come here because, as you see, the place is empty— not including the phantoms and the ghosts—a meter and a half! I tell them to keep their distance too!” he is saying, as he chuckles loudly, “really, I think this is the safest place to be—no one has been here for months—I mean, if you don’t count Hamlet,” and here he laughs again

I catch a shadowy glimpse of him and then.... he disappears again —submerging into the darkness —then he reappears, reminding me of a kind of Houdini act, even as his voice continues on, talking away as with a lot of activity on his side of the screen. In fact, quite a lot of movement and sounds of bleeps, gashes of music, levers and switches being hit, echoing, clanging, his footsteps, props being moved.... and then! A bright white flash of light pops on; a round spotlight appears first alone in the blackness before more lights follow in a kind of picture spectrum of colors and all the time he is still talking from somewhere. It is only now when he adjusts the light then when I realize I am looking at a platformed stage. Oh.... then it occurs to me this must be the opera house as the focus is now clearer in the light

“....this is the orchestra pit,” he is saying as now a focused light appears he must be controlling and waves the light about like it is a pointer device as he now adds a sudden blast of some recorded music—yes! that I recognize! 

“Oh that’s....!” I start to say and move closer to the screen more curious and —now thinking I am starting to make sense of what this is about and maybe ....where this is going 

“Yes, it’s Jörn’s piece — actually, as a matter of fact, from that night,” he remarks with a kind of giggle as he adds, “I think we recorded that crack of lighting, if you listen....” he says all this from the reaches beyond as he has not returned to the camera’s angle

but I am wondering why he is showing me. Well, I mean, it is interesting. I’m entertained.  A good distraction. As it has been such a dreary wet day I think  ....as more lights come on and then go off, changing the atmosphere .... 

....until hmm, some image in the background is projected

“There!” he says and seems to move the focus or....? what is that? the image in the background now blown up and projected becomes more sharp 

“Oh my god....” I guess I actually gasp out loud because I realize —the image is mine. I mean— that is my painting he’s somehow projecting  ....or paintings.... why and how ....? one or two projected somehow and then overlaid —now three .... and somehow seem to take on a whole new life this way with the music, the stage and the mood

and .... 

I suddenly feel myself break into a sweat, now hyper aware as the music reaches a like a kind of level of hysteria ....or is it just me?

Gadgets indeed.... I am thinking

does it matter

 

into the stillness stare

intent and wait and strain to hear

and start to fear

that what if what I thought was there

just never was

Intermezzo noir

 

When I’ve had enough of the Caberet Headquarters dungeon; the weirdness of subterranean life, like living underground, viewing the world in cyber space I can only do that for so long .... I really don’t like that because I so detest being trapped inside. it is like torture —especially this year.... like everyone else 

so much prefer being outside; among trees and wild life .... so desperately long for the forest tree lined trails, the grass and the woods 

Likewise, the desperate need for anything tactile 

which, this year, calls for some extreme invention of ideas towards the primitive 

considering survival options for planning what to do with a long winter stretching ahead.... promising drear.... 

avoiding populous; crowds; society 

....without climbing the walls for the next six months —at least— of Adirondaks mountain-cold; caveman snow and high altitude blizzards; it fills me with dread

hopefully still containing the memory of how to use practical physical exertion skills with some prospect of discernible application

I decide, as I have always had an interest to experiment in botany.... 

to order a wide range of things to grow in doors 

Which today prompts what’s in hand upon their arrival by post —along with what I come to realize is quite an ambitious amount of terra-cotta pots.... I suppose I must have been quite bored at the time I placed the order —as I am faced with a kind of endless and involved Russian-doll task of having to unpack the daunting lot. Adrift in bubble-wrap, seeming a twisting sheet of several meters-long stream of a recycled, paper, boa constrictor, and a million environmentally-friendly (how friendly?) packing peanuts .... what the fuck was I thinking that day? At least the mess is all in the farmhouse, so Jörn won’t have any idea of the extent of my madness 

having dragged the boxes down the hill, as I couldn’t have chanced dropping them through the pantry trap door 

immediately have to go about rearranging my artist’s studio to accommodate some space. 

I always find the process of physical work to be a great device for meditation and clothed in my favorite artist smock gear of paint splattered black leggings with my paint smeared giant plaid flannel shirt—a hundred sizes too big to allow for the several layers beneath, much required in the freezing and gutted farmhouse. So, sleeves rolled up to my elbows, get to work; first sweeping away the summer debris of bugs and then set up rows of metal racks; which arrived a few days ahead, thankfully, I’ve already set up — intended for drying herbs. But then I am finding now I’m thinking of other possibilities.... Is there enough space for candle making I wonder? —as I don’t like being bored.... maybe they could be put in the Caberet catalogue ....?

The gust of cold should have alerted me,

“What is all this?”

“Uh—what?” I walk straight towards my easel and brushes, “just paint and things....gosh, that meeting ended sooner than you expected, how was it?”

Still he looks stubbornly back at the slithering Basilisk-like ‘boa constrictor’ taking over the majority of the farmhouse floor.... along with the infestation of peanuts ....and taking in the mass array of seemingly multiplying terra-cotta pots with a dubious expression

 of ....some kind that I ....don’t know how to interpret (—maybe it’s disbelief?)

 ....and decide not to 

and focus on what is in front of me as his appearance is a sexy distraction.... like how good he looks in that shade of gray with his eyes ....

“So how was it?” I ask going over to him

“What?” he says as I reach up to loosen his hair and watch it fall through my fingers,

“what is that—cedar or cloves?—you smell good....” and breathe it in

“You’re trying to distract me....” but I don’t let him finish that and kiss his mouth, “....from the fire hazard going on in here....” he mumbles anyway 

“It’s just a new project —I would have had it all done in here had you kept to your schedule—so why are you back early?”

“I just didn’t feel right about you being here without.... I just wanted to double check the security system —oh, that’s right! —there’s interesting development with the vaccine I need to act on ....” but I sense he wants to distract me from what he began to say

“What do you mean?”I ask, but kissing me back, clearly he decides, instead to continue my line of attack with marked proficiency 

“I mean, maybe you should leave this hazard in here for later and come back up the hill with me,” even as he raises me onto the nearest countertop, moving his hands up the paint splattered leggings, “but first I think I need to give you a bath—you’re so filthy!”

which is true. he’s not kidding.... as we really have to get better about cleaning this farmhouse and I think I say something like that or —maybe it was, “yeah, I feel so dirty, let’s go....” but then we don’t go right away 

next scene; Electra’s dictionary/a stairway to heaven; a denouement .... and the vampire noir (jm muse continues)

 

****

I guess, at this time it is necessary to elaborate more in detail things I have only touched upon

 —if we are ever to reach Paradiso (or do I mean Valhalla?—with Jörn as guide?)

******

the morning after.... 

I wake up hungry and go to the kitchen and start to make something for breakfast ....he has gone for his run .... in front of the stove, I find I get lost in thought and ....need to write 

because as I think about Jörn and his more lucid and sensitive moments of .... what is that? Reflection? I was going to say emotions, but is it that....? as I struggle to pinpoint if I’ve observed .... any there but.... there have been moments —like .... well.... I have seen those glimpses about him, especially engrossed in his music, or when I know he remembers and thinks about those memories that we both share.... the dreams from what I have come to accept as real; from an actual real life.... dare I say it here? and all that too about Jörn— I know he feels there is something to it there 

And even related to present life, how when something is going on —I have seen he avoids it

as I am aware he does feel deeply because— I have seen the hints of it behind his eyes.... those hints of something quite deep and intense— but he will not express this, I know I have seen it pass across his features and I have felt it from him—but something seems to always stop him from letting it; from fully feeling it.... and I think something keeps him from letting himself

it is the intensity. Only I do not believe it is as simple as ‘fear’

..... I saw it that night; it was before he left for Sweden back in September—it was that night when he found me.... outside .... the night after the zoom call with Paulina, when I found I’d faced some demons from out of the closet .... and I saw something there in his face when he found me on the ground; it was there on his face—like a window shade drawn down showing almost another face— a moment there it was; across his features, a white fear; a glimpse of worry—and I saw .... was it that he thought.... ? he had found me with the pocket knife.... and then I moved and —then it was gone; it just quickly evaporated from his face; like the shade quickly shot up.... but right before it went I saw it there clearly— I think maybe it was terror, you see, because he could not find words after as he looked at me to even express what I could see had been there just a moment before in his eyes.... 

those deeper emotions which I am certain are there but that he steers clear of. Each time I have ever asked what he feels, he refers to his music .... is that his legend? the keys.... his own keys to everything ....?

and so I have to wonder about the dreams ....with their terrors —like the music to his opera which he has mentioned before; like the battles that he has referenced....  like those shadows I have watched on the wall as he plays out scenes of a life and its purpose to compose it which seems to mean more than to share it or have it performed .... are the smeden’s swords there too in his music, I wonder?—the endless nights by the forge? ....maybe they are there too in his music.... like the beach and the stars; the moon.... and running into the waves —to drown ....the beach and the midnight sun .... it is all in his music, isn’t it? have I not heard it? I recognize it all, I realize 

and even the last memory in the hut .... with the hides turning red with blood .... as I have also known and felt ....going cold and looking up and seeing, watching me, those vampire eyes 

It cannot be that it is just to dream of —not just to haunt a soul. It must mean something more than —just this 

and his music— to him, it must mean more, the musical keys more than just keys to music— because, I think, they are more like actual keys 

these things in every day life

we walk by 

we ignore them 

don’t we laugh at strange coincidences? 

No, instead it is easier to believe what society ingrains, isn’t it? Empty material concerns which in the end mean nothing at all and .....we are all required to be part of a machine and  for whose benefit? an assigned role to live a life which blinds too many to live such empty lives. So why is the world so dissatisfied? Is anyone really alive?

So long ago when I first began to have the dreams —when I was going to see Dr. Rothschild. I told her about them and —she believed me. That is why she regressed me.  Did hypnosis which, she told me at the time, was frowned down upon by her profession but— as she was soon retiring to write a book on her works, she felt daring to break some rules. And.... I know, to also document 

I get a chill now and half consider calling Gerald to talk.... because ..... as I write these thoughts into my phone .... it feels like something necessary is surfacing 

but I find myself locked in a kind of wonder .... as if on the edge of some kind of epiphany 

 —if Jörn has been my Virgil, maybe it is no accident then .....is it possible too, then —that maybe I am —his— Beatrice.... ? 

to take some journey back to .... his battlefields .... and face emotions

and maybe the music is a kind of ‘bridge’ —his own need to integrate something because 

as he seems not have access to something .... that keeps him from experiencing — but the opera ....it haunts him like a tug-of-war that keeps that hold on him and pulls him back and I see how it refuses to let him go 

So now I think.... as I know I search and struggle to understand life and meaning; especially now in this nightmare of times of what feels too much in this present life as apocalyptic times. 

So ..... I guess I find I wonder.... dictionary..... what if to each other we are both guides?

who found each other for this purpose; both artists who are a bit ill equipped with expressing in the ordinary ways but to each other somehow find ways to communicate; like pictures in the sand ....and it occurs to me, as it so often has, that he understands me better than ....anyone I have ever known 

My mind goes back to that day before he left—what he had asked me that day....what was it he said?....I forget his exact words something like “How was it that I beat the odds of the statistics?”

because I had once told him what Dr. Rothschild has said (no, that was not really her name, I chose this name for a decoy to conceal who she really was as her family was also of another well known dynasty —in this country—so, for purposes here, this name characterizes and safely serves to deflect who she really was; as woven in, much of what I write is actually true)

   

when she had called me a “trailblazer mapping my own course in uncharted territory when no one else known ever had....” because around the time I went to see her there had been no known documented cases of someone who had survived to adulthood —

I mean....so again, I say this: I guess at this time it is necessary to elaborate more in detail of things I have only touched upon....

It was because, you see, I had not succumbed to the statistics — those peer reviewed, documented and charted cases of those who, to put it bluntly: beginning at an early age, those who were victims of physical and sexual abuse on a regular basis and which, oddly enough, always seemed to be the prologue to later experiences in young adult life of violence and rape, lending a checkerboard pattern of calamities throughout their short lifespan. In effect, what would tend to follow was a life of drug addictions leading to overdose, or experiences of assault or their own intended suicide. As two other ....such persons.... I have known in my family whom —I have made reference to here....

****

I am sill in the kitchen when he returns from his morning run. 

he intrepidly walks over to me and tries to be somewhat playful, not knowing how to act after last night— which, he may not realize, be that as it may, after a month of dormancy, has left me sore— and more in his favor

but still he says,

“your flaming ginger roots are growing in,” as he tries to make light conversation, “they make it look like your scalp is on fire—have you decided to stop making it that dark burgundy?” 

I am not sure whether to laugh or to be offended,

“I just haven’t been in the mood for the whole henna process.... Jörn, I’m not mad at you....” I say looking up at him, “you don’t have to act like you need to walk on egg shells....”

“No.... but I think .... I understand.... what you have been trying to say....” which does surprise me. He moves nearer to me where I am mixing a pot of porridge; today it is whole grain wheat and the warm aroma fills the kitchen. He takes a lingering reflective moment to play with my hair roots, “I don’t understand why you go through the trouble to cover it, some people would kill to have this color naturally.”

“It’s almost blonde now. I don’t see myself as a blonde.  But, the effort to bother lately doesn’t feel worth it—“

“No, it’s definitely still red— it’s  flaming!” he teasingly objects 

“—so what exactly do you understand? —what Jörn? I mean, since now you have mentioned it....?”

“You think I come and go as I please ....with no concern for you.”

“It was a month with hardly a phone call, who knows what you get up to back in Sweden with your ex there among others....”

“My ex? Duva, I wasn’t just in Sweden, I was actually on the move quite a lot, and that is why I did not have a lot of time to ....call. I’m sorry. My work gets in the way of things like this. Probably why, before we met, I had not been in any meaningful relationship for a long time.... But, listen, there is something else you should know—“ he pauses an instant to meet my eyes, “I guess you won’t be shocked to know this because of Gerald— I was being followed by—a certain demon of —your—past....”

If I was not sure whom, his tone is enough to fill in as it does not take me long to deduce

“Nevik Retnuh....?” it comes out in a rushed whisper as I shudder and stare back into his eyes

And his eyes squint a bit in reply as answer and indicates the affirmative with the slightest nod of his head and then he reaches for me as I seem to suddenly lose my balance and stumble,

imperceptibly, his touch is unobtrusively —affectionate; he grasps hold of my elbow to steady me

“Why do you think he was following —you?” I ask

“Well because.... of a certain set of things I am now again in possession of ....”

“The safe! And the table?”

He hardly moves a muscle as he looks directly into my eyes; their vampire heat seems to dance there, deep within the platinum blue with some mad and wild flame

The dizziness of fear rushes through me and I reach for the feel of the stove to right myself to gravity