The Death of Imagination

My lungs cleared up! I can breathe again!

Before my lungs cleared up, I had no idea how compromised I was. I mean, I could feel the stiffness in my chest, and logically I know I know that if you can't breathe well, you don't take in enough oxygen, which leads to air hunger, which leads to shortness of breath with physical exertion—but I wasn't connecting the dots.

I was thinking the fatigue I was feeling when exercising was due to some sudden acceleration in the physical aging process! I am 73! And after all, that is old!

And 73 continues to be old—but still, when I went to the gym yesterday, for my weights circuit and 30-minute cardiovascular workout (spinning), I felt great!

Though two days before, I'd been laboring for breath and my muscles had actually been aching with the lifting effort (lactic acid buildup.)

I have no idea why my lungs cleared up. Did some lethal allergen finally disappear from the air? Did some nasty virus finally run its course?

But I am grateful, Universe!

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Other than that...

I've been busily generating income, watching instructional videos on making AI videos, and trying to think of ways to expand my social life in the here and now.

Basically, I'm resentful about the first because I think I deserve a MacArthur Genius Grant for pursuing the second, and if the kiskas and Black Chicken would only learn to speak English, I wouldn't have to worry at all about the third.

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I'm trying to identify the video creation service with the best bang for the buck, but that's difficult because right now AI video is in its gold rush phase. There is no available enterprise software; there are literally dozens of AIV engines attached to subscription services, new workflow and pipeline technologies are constantly raising the bar, and the state of the art is changing on a weekly—sometimes daily—basis.

This one was done on the Chinese AI video engine Kling. I reused my calico cat prompt. I actually like the one I did on NightCafe (same starting prompt) better for sheer fantasia. But there's no denying this one has a higher degree of photo realism.



Thing is, though, I'm not big on photo realism.

I much prefer fantastical imagery and animation.

In the middle of the night, I dreamed that Ben had come back to tie up loose ends, shut down an apartment where (presumably) we'd lived together. He was cold, sardonic, demonic; I couldn't quite understand what was going on. RTT was a very young child, not present, but an issue between us.

Then I was in a bar with M____ S_______ (in real life, Ben's very pleasant cousin, the one who told me many years after: We all knew what Ben was. But what could we say to you? You'd made up your mind.)

M____ was very sympathetic: Let me buy you a drink.

And then I remembered the pets, our animals: the two dogs, Milo & Xena, and a cat of whom I was very, very fond—only I couldn't remember the cat's name or even what the cat looked like—

I've got to go back for them, I told M____. Someone's got to walk those dogs. I imagined the abandoned house filling slowly up with shit.

He didn't tell you? M____ asked. And then she described how Ben had poisoned the dogs. With a specially formulated dog food, evidently manufactured for the sole purpose of getting rid of no-longer-loved pets.

I believed her, but still I wanted to get back to the house—my cat would still be there. So, I started wandering through the streets of a city. (I think I've dreamed about this city before, though of course, dream cities always come packaged with extra echoes & deja vu.) The streets were wide and unfamiliar. I thought I saw the building—very grand, made of limestone with imposing pillars—and then I thought, No, that's where Rik lives—

###

Was that a nightmare? I wondered when I awoke. It lacked the grand guignol imagery, the horror movie ambiance.

But it had certainly been disturbing enough so that I never fell totally back to sleep. Instead, I grazed on sleep, a little casual brain nourishment, so my Fitbit would register eight hours this morning.

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And musing about the dream now, I'm thinking that of all the awful things Ben did—their names are legion, though to counterbalance that, he was the world's best banterer, & I love banter above all things—the absolute worst was reneging upon his offer to take Milo when I left Ithaca.

I absolutely knew the moment I left Ithaca, I would be perfectly fine.

But I also knew there was no way I was going to find a place to live closer to New York City with two cats (Rutger & the Meezer) and a dog.

So I begged Ben: Please, please, please take Milo.

And at first, Ben said he would.

But then he wouldn't.

And I didn't know what to do.

Except then I had to take Milo for a vet visit, & the vet told me, He has a very virulent form of cancer.

And I had to have Milo put to sleep shortly thereafter.

I knew Milo died to let me live.

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I have a history of pets dying at critical turns in my life.

Like in 1993, a week before I left for Clarion, Dennis Hopper and Hedda Hopper—my two angora rabbits, whom I used to let run around all day long in my wild tangle of backyard—leapt so high, they broke their spines.

Me being me, of course, I entertained a fantasy: I would cancel Clarion! I would find a carpenter who would construct the bunnies little platforms on wheels that they could propel around on; I would pilfer tiny catheters from the NICU and once a day drain their urine. I would live out the rest of my life as the caretaker of my paraplegic rabbits!

Before the rabbits jumped and broke their spines, I had been agonizing: Who will take care of my bunnies while I'm gone???

And then I realized: The rabbits had broken their spines, so that I could get away.

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Morbid morning thoughts!

Anyway.

Yesterday's Adrienne meet-and-greet was great fun, chiefly because it was held in a historic house built in 1750 by one of the minor Dutch patroons in these parts who threw in his lot with the rebel army.





The house is owned by a billion-year-old psychoanalyst who led multiple tours through its sumptuously appointed interior, regularly stopping at the little nook where he used to see patients & waving airily at the reclining couch: "If you squint hard enough, you can still see all their dark thoughts swirling towards the ceiling!"

All those rewatches of The West Wing have not been in vain! Pretending to be a staffer, I was a fuckin' rockstar!

Even the decidedly ungracious Adrienne texted afterwards, You were a gracious host and an awesome presence as so many people remarked!

Well. Not so many people, I'm thinking. The turnout was small. But the longest journey begins with but a single step, the winning campaign starts with but two people in a room, blah, blah, blah.

Here I am in my newly purchased, high-waisted, floral Pride & Prejudice garb looking suitably triumphant: