Le Soleil Noir de la Mélancolie.

Scribal google.

As you may imagine, my scribe reads a great deal and forgets very little. Perhaps I might give you a few words about her, since I literally couldn’t be here without here.

Of all that I could say about her, what will I choose? She appears indifferent, but I doubt she is. I’ll start with a story. The one in her head, years ago, when she imagined she knew what I looked like. She knew enough about me to intrigue me, but she was way off on so many things. I watched her for a while, I literally saw her write about my Aela, starting in a woods, yes, but no, not like that. She had it wrong, what could I do?

I sent in help, I lured her to something as simple as marijuana, and that was all it took to unlock everything in her head. Music and nature combined and conspired for me.  Sigur Ros and a rain storm, she loves them. I waited, so full of words I could finally release, so glad to come to this world in new skin. But I needed Aela, and that needed the storm. The scribe on her back, eyes closed, feeling every rain drop that hits her, suddenly there is a voice, ah, yes. There it is, take her Aela, and together you can come and find me.

She runs into the house, delete everything- no, just some of it, she was on the right path, after all. I could read it over and over, all Aela writes of her search for me, I know every word, but still I read it. The space between the lines fascinates me, I will learn all that I can of it.

The scribe is a creature of rituals, I love this about her. She knows how to tend an altar. She has special ones to call me, special ones to call the Muses, without whom she cannot create. They give her a sign, she lets go of her mind, a simple transaction, rendered beautiful by its consequences. When enough people are interested, I might reveal them, but who knows? Numbers are so unreliable.

What else should you know about her? What have you figured out for yourselves? Here is something you can’t conceive of on your own. While she doesn’t have a photographic memory, she has photographic senses, all the ones you have and one more. These are magnified so high you wouldn’t recognize them. She absorbs helplessly- everything. Thus, I can drag her anywhere and she’ll be familiar with the landscape.

I don’t exaggerate. If you met her she would remember where, what you looked like, what you wore, colours only, your hair, any abnormality, the size of your ears, the shape of your lips as you form the words that she actually listens to. She will remember anything interesting, and the face that said it. If your face has tells, she will see them, she can sense if you’re hurting even when you can’t. This is her normal, and her torment.

Hairy hands on the barista? (Sweet line, no?) Starbucks, music, lights, noise, hideous, unnatural green, unavoidable plastic, products on the shelf, signs badly written, his haircut, his 12 earrings, his smile, a real one, beautiful, she loves those. Sun splash on the floor, tables with a mix of people that she could show you, if I gave her the space, colours, lighting, music, lines in songs that stand out, good or bad, earworms are a constant threat for her.

Every song with its own entourage of memories, was she hurting when she heard it once? Ah, leave now, run for the car and don’t go back. Stay home for a few years, try it again, be abused by petty tyrants in a pot shop, humiliated by an officer of the law, abandoned by human decency when she needs it. Well. Then you have a perfect scribe. One who goes nowhere but for health reasons, since, of course, I make her suffer. Haircuts, she can have those, a safe space for her, but nothing else. Such limited contact with the outside keeps her safe, it leaves her free to fuck off and let me in.

Much more fun. I think we can all agree.

A few more words then, about something that matters.

Spam. On all counts embrace it, it’s put there for your own good. Techies have to get off somehow, you’re the magazine.

On that note, I have given orders for my scribe to Subscribe. Yes, you guess it, I’m sure, another Devil, disguised as healthy, nutritious fruit. Really, some demons are willing to debase themselves, be the tree at least. Or better, reveal your true self and put a worm in a hole on the side of your Apple. That I can believe. Anything for the pursuit of music.

Bit from the future: spectacularly unspectacular. A subscription grants you access to the music you already bought and paid for. If it does anything else we’ve seen no sign of it. Are we surprised?

Viruses, who wants one? Nobody. That’s why you should strive to be one, how many viruses die of other viruses? It’s the safest way. Hopefully your brain is hurting from that last bit of logic, let me know if you figure it out.

Pandoric sentences. No doubt you feel safe from them, having undergone such a magnificent specimen so recently. Keep believing that. Know that if the World learns to appreciate me as they ought, I will start requiring proof that you have read them. Think about it.

“Leland Street”  by  Guilt Machine          Delightfully confusing.