it's marlowe to you, sucka.

[like neon lights]

Marlowe was gripping the phone, trying to keep himself standing upright when Demitri called. This was all very shocking and he felt like his knees would give at any second.

"No! Nooo -- ohhh I'm sorry, okay. I know it isn't funny, I know! Demitri, I'm sorry, I promise I won't laugh anymore--" But the promise was quickly broken when he dissolved into more hysterical laughter and ended up on the floor. "Demitri-- ohhh God, okayokay. Okay. Yes, I'm fine. Are you okay? How much is bail? I'll bring it right down. Okay. I promise I won't laugh. No, I really mean it this time. I'm serious! I won't laugh, I swear to God. Unless they have you in an orange jumper. Then I will. But if not, it's okay. OKAY I'm coming, sorry. Love you, bye."

Poor Demitri. He really did marry a lunatic.

[like neon lights]

They say that the decent into madness is slow, usually, and that the person descending more often than not is aware that they are, indeed, failing at life in sanity. I do not feel as though I am failing in sanity, but I do feel as though I may slowly be driving myself mad with the domestic routine, if you can call it a routine, that I have currently prepared for myself and Demitri. I have never been one to travel extensively --

No, that's a lie. Now I've become a liar.

I have traveled far and wide, I have never stayed in any one place for as long as this. I know Demitri's heart is the same way, though his is seemingly belonging to me and he says he is content in whatever we choose to do. I make it hard for him to love me, I am aware of this, and I make it even harder when I get this way. But I cannot help this, as it is the way I have always been, and only one person that I have ever met has been able to try and understand me and my slow descent. I married him. While I do not feel that this is a mistake by any means, I feel that I should have loved him more than to bind him to a life at the side of a lunatic. It isn't fair to anyone, my mood swings are horrendous and I cannot control them, not even with medication. Medication never seems to do anything for me and I really wish it did. Then I might be normal.

In my abnormality, I find solace in my painting. At least, usually. Lately the art of smearing a canvas with color (or a lack thereof) when things get fuzzy in my head has not proved to be therapeutic so much as it has irritating. I do not wish to paint anymore. Not at the present time, I should say, but I do not feel as though this is a mental block, like the writer's have, but maybe a state of mental maturation. Perhaps I have grown past the inability to cope with my emotions but on canvas and have graduated into sharing them with one person --

Problem being that I do not confide often in Demitri, as I fear he will regret the decision to love me and will revoke it fully and wholeheartedly. I don't know why I feel that he can do that so easily, as I could never do that to him, but I do. I feel that he could leave me at any given moment -- it isn't fair to think that of him because I do know that he would not. At least I hope that I know that.

Writing this down provides no relaxation for my tense nerves anymore either. I don't know what will, but I think it's time to move on... maybe just a vacation. An extended stay somewhere --

I really wouldn't mind going back to Russia. Maybe Demitri would like to see his brother again. But since the choices have always been mine and he has always been the support net for me, I believe I will begin to let him choose. I am not so unstable anymore: I will not fall apart if things don't go the way I think they should.

Demitri has taught me so much.

[like neon lights]

"Demitri! Are you there? Answer the phone if--oh wait, this is voicemail, isn't it? Fuck. Uh. I just wanted you to meet me downtown... some guy has a gallery and wants me to put my work in it, but I'm not sure what to do... if I should or not. I don't knooooow, I need you to make up my mind for me.

I couldn't find my shoes today either. Did you hide them? I think it was the gremlins.

I'm going to call you in ten minutes, until you answer. Please? Love you."

[the boulevard]

<center>


"If You're Gonna Jump"

I got a short attention span
Can't sit around couch potato land
I wanna do all kinds of stuff
Talking about it's not enough
I wanna go to the extreme
I wanna stretch my limousine
I wanna take it way off road
Go where I'm not supposed to go

Life is music, play it louder

If you're gonna jump, then jump far, fly like a sky diver
If you're gonna be a singer, then you better be a rockstar
If you're gonna be a driver, then you better drive a race car
Cause I'm looking for a guard dog, not buying a chihuahua

I like my food with chili in
I like to laugh til it turns in
I wanna stare fear in the face
I wanna take it all the way

Life is music play it louder

If you're gonna jump, then jump far, fly like a sky diver
If you're gonna be a singer, then you better be a rockstar
If you're gonna be a driver, then you better drive a race car
Cause I'm looking for a guard dog, not buying a chihuahua

If you're gonna jump, then jump far,
If you're gonna
If you're gonna hit the high notes, you gotta be a diva
If you're gonna play a guitar, you gotta play til you blister
Cause I'm looking for a guard dog not buying a chihuahua

No happy apples for my tea
It's hot or cold no in between

If you're gonna jump
If you're gonna jump
If you're gonna jump

If you're gonna jump, then jump far, fly like a sky diver
If you're gonna be a singer, then you better be a rockstar
If you're gonna be a driver, then you better drive a race car
Cause I'm looking for a guard dog, not buying a chihuahua

If you're gonna jump, then jump far,
If you're gonna
If you're wanna hit the high notes, you gotta be a diva
If you're gonna play a guitar, you gotta play til you blister
Cause I'm looking for a guard dog not buying a chihuahua</center>

<font color="#FFFFFF"><font size="1">[ August 10, 2005 11:49 AM: Message edited by: track marks ]</font></font>

<font color="#FFFFFF" size="1">[ August 10, 2005 11:50 AM: Message edited by: track marks ]</font>

[the boulevard]

He started with the living room first. The mural that had once been such a testament to life, to color, was painted over in blackness until he could clear his head enough to create again. Contemplating the empty palette (as black was the absence of all color) with a handful of goldfish crackers systematically feeding his mouth, he wondered how funny it would be to paint an underwater theme. Like a cruise ship gone wrong. But goldfish didn't live in the ocean, he supposed, and they weren't as cute as the crackers were anyway.

Then he contemplated painting crackers and decided that he'd had enough eating for one day and moved on to the stairwell, with it's black and red tones, muted like the red light district, the colors stretching all the way to the top of the staircase. He was going to paint over his classy bordello creation with stark whiteness and he continued that whiteness into the kitchen and over the cabinets and table and appliances -- everything he owned would be a customizable potential piece of artwork and as a blank canvas was the only way he could create, painting over it was logical.

Upstairs, all of the rooms and the hallways, were infused with his own concotion of redness (God bless Sherwin William) because he had an idea for that which may have been more twisted psychotic than creative genius, but what did he care? There wouldn't be anyone around to see this anymore, other than a one night stand here and there, because out of everything in his unnaturally long life, ONE thing was made abundantly clear:

Marlowe was destined to be alone and alone he would remain, unwilling to fight it any longer.

All of his possessions were given away to charities and homeless people, traded in for something newer, something that didn't remind him of anything.
All of his clothes were tossed until he was left with only the jeans he'd worn for years now (too many holes and paint stains and frays to wear in public and he did it anyway), a pair that were newer and less paint spattered and a few sweaters he couldn't part with. Other articles were given to museums because he didn't need them anymore and they were absolutely delighted to have them.

What worried Marlowe most, though, was that he couldn't decide what to paint. Themes or no themes. Pollock, Picasso or Marlowe?

Maybe a few more walks in the park, barefoot when it was nearly freezing, and maybe a few more glasses of whiskey at the bar downtown where he knew a few people and maybe a little more vicodin would help him out of his reverie and into the world of the working, living, breathing, painting.

Maybe it would kill him.
Either way.

<center></center>

[the boulevard]

Article: November 2005.

The enigmatic artist known as Marlowe, and only Marlowe as he will correct you when asked, has finally agreed to present a new gallery of artwork.

Many have been waiting with bated breath for the next production from this mysterious man out of who-knows-where, and though personal secrets are well guarded within him, the certainty is that the man can paint. Paint with a passion unrivaled in today's artistic society, or so many experts have said.

Though unsure the date and time and place of this new gallery opening, the fact that this event is even taking place is the newest diamond in the art industry's crown of jewels. Although cliche, there is not one ear to the ground who is not listening for coming news of the impending brilliance of Marlowe.

[the boulevard]

There has been nothing that has moved me to write in quite some time, though I cannot say that I mind this. The less that I have to write, the better, I am no writer nor am I an artist or sane person, I only play cleverly at them all.

Nothing of me is original. I heard that once, or read it in a book, I'm not sure which. Nothing of me is original. I have repeated it over and over until I realized that yes, it is true and no, I cannot change this fact. I do not wish to be argued with though the arguments have come fiercely without invitation, maybe I am not so less as I think, but then why would I think it? Silly thoughts.

Phonecalls are becoming more and more frequent, I find it disturbing. I may have to fake yet another death and take on yet another alias and move to another country yet again, though I do not wish to. I do not wish to have this fame either, I never wanted my work to be discovered but all good things come to an end and I should be more happy that I am selling paintings, though I am no starving artist I think that everyone thinks I am. They call me bohemian, a free spirit. How little they know.

They they they, this all sounds so cryptic and it needn't be. I make myself cryptic when I needn't be. I make myself a lot of things when I needn't be, I wonder what the point is. I wonder what the point of being blessed with such an obnoxiously long life is if I cannot do anything with it due to my own sick fears.

I wish I knew what I was instead of playing at this guessing game all of the time. I am much too old of a man to feel this unsure about everything. I am much too old of a man to feel this pathetic and lonely, I know that. I shouldn't feel like I need someone near me at all times -- maybe I can call myself a social creature and leave it at that, though I am intolerable and my own husband cannot even stand me, though I do not know that he is my husband any longer.



I suppose I don't know anything anymore and maybe I will move to Iceland. I hear it's lovely there this time of year.

[our decadency]

I think I may be dead.
I hope that I am dead.
I think I may be gone.
I hope that I am gone.
I think that I am rotting.
I hope that I am not.

I think that I am wasting away.
I hope that no one will notice.

[our decadency]

I heard a song today. I want to find my one, the only one -- I need to share this life with someone, even if I have no life to share.

Something needs to change... something needs to change or there will be nothing left of me but a shell.

I fear I am the shell already, like a giant lobster. Only not as tasty.

<center>We'll do it all
Everything
On our own

We don't need
Anything
Or anyone

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

I don't quite know
How to say
How I feel

Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads

I need your grace
To remind me
To find my own

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes, they're all I can see

I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things will never change for us at all

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?</center>

[our decadency]

I heard a song today. I want to find my one, the only one -- I need to share this life with someone, even if I have no life to share.

Something needs to change... something needs to change or there will be nothing left of me but a shell.

I fear I am the shell already, like a giant lobster. Only not as tasty.

<center>We'll do it all
Everything
On our own

We don't need
Anything
Or anyone

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

I don't quite know
How to say
How I feel

Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads

I need your grace
To remind me
To find my own

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes, they're all I can see

I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things will never change for us at all

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?</center>