↑ Vantage pt for Jay Levine at tippity top of crow's nest before he jumped.
Das Boot: the first and perhaps most profound of the Dreamscape categories in that it describes not only the day-to-day adventures of a Caribbean escape, but also a moment that was much of a fulcrum or a rubicon for everyone involved, both a gathering and a dispersal. They were all twenty-four or twenty-five years old, an age where everything in the past seems like prologue and the next turned page is where the story really begins. There was a lot of debate about what comes next: plans hatched, destinies reconsidered. And soon after: Sebastian heading for Brazil, Christoph to Argentina, Helene to New Zealand, our pal Jayson and Natalie both to New York City. And the more we studied these pages, the stronger the urge became to apply allegory and deeper significance to everything that was written. And although 'reality' strongly resists such neat and tidy structuring, nonetheless here it is.
-- Eds
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Das Boot (1/33)
December 5, 1990
Choose a different dreamscape
On a plane and on the move again, heading this time 1st to San Juan and 2nd to St. Lucia where I meet Sebastian and Natalia for 3 weeks of nursing my wounds and floating through tepid Caribbean waters. After that, it seems, I’ll need a new place to hang my hat which APPEARS, at this moment to likely be somewhere in NYC (perhaps with old pal Dex Lightmore?). How did this come to pass? Simple and nothy (note worthy) and worth a quick summary of… whoops, nope. Take off approaches; tray tables up.
— 9:45pm
St. Juan (Puerto Rico), filled with oppressive dense air and rapid-fire Spanish. I only just discovered the area which contained 25¢ lockers which first consumed then regurgitated my bag with barely enough space in-between for me to step out… whoops…
— 1am
Arrived! St. Lucia, and brought by mini cab in trans-mountainous journey to Marigot Bay where I finally can sit and scribble in the dim and obscure glow of a kerosene (cheapest combustible fuel) lantern aboard none other than the fabled St. Alamé. And the climate alone, as Natalia so aptly noted, is enough to induce an acute sense of culture shock.
Let’s see, oh yes! Hint of old paranoid visions when my up-to-that-point friendly and hospitable cabbie veered onto a never-used + rutted + pitted dirt road, meeting numerous friends (his, not mine) as we traversed the deadly pitches toward what end(?!) through this barely illuminated tunnel of tight darkness in the yellowish gloom of the headlights. Much talk of skinbarking which took me awhile to decipher but once I did we all shared some good, lewd, male ribaldry about it and elbowing. I could (and may?) pursue that with Amy.
Did I mention I’m on a boat? I hear the creak + crinkle of water. A rooster crows(?!) – odd but true as it’s only, say, 1:30am, which seems either quite late or quite early for a rooster. But there it is. Silence and peace surround us. The only remaining, major question for the evening… shall I piss off the side or not? I shall.
Comments (2)
I’m still trying to figure out skinbarking… barking, like, as in, dog? Or bark having to do with trees?
I think it evolved from the meaning of ‘scraping’ (like barking one’s shins) but in this case, a prurient sense, wink wink.