do you like American music?

May 11

do you like american music?

I. MIDDLE NAMES

I know everyone’s middle name because I ask them. Some people ask about signs, siblings, birthdays, years. I ask about middle names. Especially if I note that your left handed. I prefer long first names, manipulations with fingers and men without middles. I like left handed lovers because it is some kind of concept of symmetry which I believe that I alone noted. In fact, I must have invented it.

I have no middle name. I was supposed to pick it myself when I turned 18. I wasn’t supposed to have a “confirmation” I was not supposed to be surrounded by real Catholics. I turned eighteen and I couldn’t think of anything. “Dan-yell-ah Scream-ah” what could go in between that? Everyone’s middle name was “Marie”. I had nothing to work with.

After I graduated high school, after I had come up with my brilliant plan of moving to Ohio to watch the dying, I was in the back seat of a car. It was Amanda McCarthy’s car and Kris King was in the front seat. Amanda will be a successful lawyer; Kris will appear in the face of every tree, every man, every nun, every child. I will lie in the backseat of the car while we drive East down 60— a straight shot from Clearwater to Vero Beach. It turns into a two lane road, you are surrounded by orange groves. The smell, God, that is a wonderful smell. You know why? Because that’s where they make all of your orange juice. They make it on this stretch of road, and I am eighteen, high out of my mind in a back seat.

I am high off of prescription strength DXM— the common ingredient in cough syrup. I’ve taken it in pill format- probably fifteen or twenty capsules that someone stole from a pharmacy. I am high off of the main ingredient in cough syrup because beggars can’t be choosers. I give Kris a bunch of pills too. I am a bad influence. Amanda is on the academic team, and maybe technically so am I. I am a bad influence. We take them in a Publix parking lot. I don’t remember if we get anything from the grocery store. I feel like we may get energy drinks, because in all of these Florida stories, all of the ones where we stay up all night, there are energy drinks.

In cars, in Florida, I like to smoke Newport Cigarettes. I cannot inhale, but I can blow “o’s”. Exceptionally well, even in the wind. Sometimes I tell men I can blow hearts and they believe me. Sometimes I say I can do it in the wind and they believe me. Since turning eighteen (or thirteen, or twelve) I’ve learned that you should not tell people that you do not believe cigarettes are addictive.
You shouldn’t say to someone “I really don’t think cigarettes are addictive”, because they will become furious. Unless they are Nicholas Antonio Velasquez the III and it is New Years eve (2004) they will become furious. If they are Nick, they won’t be able to get addicted either. If they are Nick, they will try too. And everyone will say “how stupid are you?” And you will say nothing but in your mind you will ask “Why did your parents make your middle name ‘Michael’?” in your mind you will say “You didn’t know me when I was 12” because whoever you are talking to, they clearly had it easier. They don’t make jokes about rape and they sure as hell don’t read the paper.

Now— back to the backseat of the car, back to being high and eighteen because beggars can’t be choosers and nothing sounds good between “Daniela” and “Scrima” and Amanda is driving and Kris is saying he can’t feel anything yet. I keep saying “just wait, just wait.” I think I am asking him questions about masturbation. Amanda is stone sober, driving. Amanda has a good head on her shoulders. I swear to you— but this could be a lie— that at the time her favorite band is Matchbox 20. I want to jump out of the car while it is moving, but I swear that’s her favorite band. Everyone’s middle name is Marie; Everyone’s first name is Amanda.

I am begging her to drive to the east coast of Florida, and she has agreed. By the time we get there, to the other side I want to be brought to the water. It feels cold, I remember this. This could be what happens from a poor mans high or maybe there could be a strong breeze. Or maybe it’s because 60 degrees is straight up cold in Florida. But I must go into the water. We get lost, go in circles. Stop at a CVS and park at the ocean. I wade in in a white skirt. If I could go back now, the only thing I would do differently is wade in farther. I would disrobe. But it is the east Coast and the waves are large, the tide is choppy. We do not experience these extremities on the Gulf Coast unless it is hurricane season. But back then it was always hurricane season.

On the drive home, well, I don’t remember much. But I come to a decision. I am lying in the backseat of the car and i am imagining boys from the 1920’s, children actually at a baseball game. And they are all saying “there she goes— look at her Aurora Borealis” and then it hits me. That should be my middle name. Aurora Borealis. How did I not think of it before?

I do not know how I did not think of this sooner. How could it have taken me so long to find a name that would fit?

Let me stop this story for a second. Years later I am living in Brooklyn. I am talking to my friend Skye who is also from Clearwater. I have always thought it was so cool that her name was Skye. In Clearwater we once we saw a band play— I cannot remember— it was a girl singing and she had a beautiful name and we got sushi from Publix and I was jealous of her name and well— let me top this story, because years later in Brooklyn she reminds me of her name.
Her birth name was Ashley. Not skye. Ashley. When she turned thirteen she had her name legally changed to Skye. You know why? Because everyone is named Ashley.

Everyone is named Ashley or Amanda or their middle name is Marie.

But the best part of the story is that weeks later Skye (formerly known as Ashley) is listening to a song called “Hurricane” and she realizes at the age of thirteen that she has made a huge mistake. She should have not changed her name to skye, she should have changed it to Hurricane. Shes lies on the ground in Florida, her mother goes and returns orange drink to Wal-Mart, and she should have stayed an Ashley

Back to the car with Kris King and McCarthy. Back to 2003 and being 18 years old. I have baptized myself in the Atlantic Ocean. I will go to the court house in the morning. I have to pee and Amanda pulls over. I am willing to use the side of the road. I will squat next to all of the oranges. And then I see that there are signs— I swear to you that there are signs that say that there are cougars crossing, cougars. Black cougars or something like that. I imagine being mauled by the animals, pulled into the orange groves. My blood splattering the trees, the fruit. Pulp or no pulp? Do you like it with pulp or no pulp?

I like it with no pulp. For the record. Just for the record.

I hold it until the next gas station. I move to Ohio and tell my grandparents. I don’t go to the courthouse because I am still deciding. I turn 19 and my grandmother dies and I loved her more than my own mother and they take out Jackson’s liver and I don’t get a middle name. I don’t get a middle name and I smoke in a car and I wonder if my transcripts will ever be fixed. If anyone will ever have me.

Maybe I all in love, I don’t remember. I could tell you more about cough syrup, about it getting worse. But I won’t.

I will tell you this: I still have no middle name.

I will ask you this: What’s yours? What is your middle name, baby? Tell me. Please tell me. It’s perfectly fine. You can tell me your middle name. You can tell me “pulp or no pulp”

I can lie to you. I blow hearts. I was twelve. I was born. I was in a car. I can you tell the truth. I blow ohhhhs. I was eighteen. The main ingredient in cough syrup. Fiber glass in cigarettes. Someone drowns himself in the ocean. The weather man shoots himself in the face. The hurricanes stop.

What’s your middle name?

I am right handed. I never went to the court house. I turned 19 and it was too late. Are you left handed? What’s your middle name?

I was born too late, you were born too soon. But every time I look at that ugly moon, it reminds me of you. It reminds me of you.