[Essay, 12/1999]
I think that I have been here for a few days. There's a strange, been - here - for - a - few-days smell in this dark room. The blinds are drawn. My luggage is still in the corner, not unpacked. I had been to several countries, many states, countless coffee houses. I'm still wearing those Tibetan robes from looking in the monastaries. The roo ...

[Essay, 11/1999]
"With the coming of Dean Moriarty began the part of my life you could call my life on the road. Before that I’d often dreamed of going West to see the country, always vaguely planning and never taking off." You’ll have to ask my mother if I was an impressionable child. I don’t think I was, but I do have a clear memory of watching a James Bond mo ...

[Essay, 10/1999]
I remember the first time my aunt made me paranoid about neighbors. At my grandma's house there was a little yellow bedroom that we always liked to sleep in. It was usually my grandparents' bedroom, but, if grandma got into one of her mad fits of rearranging, it became free for us to stay in. The closet doors looked like venetian blinds, constru ...

[Essay, 09/1999]
"Keyser Söse." I hadn't realized that I had said that out loud. The man next to me couldn't help but look at me as if I had mistaken him for someone else. I tried to smile with a smile that conveyed the man was obviously a little touched in the head, hearing things, and I was going to politely excuse him for looking at me like that. He just went ...

[Essay, 08/1999]
There are places in every town in America where seemingly normal people turn into little Satans. These places have not been the subject of scientific study. They have not been featured in any sci- fi movies. No one wants to talk about what happens to turn these people into walking, spewing volcanoes everyday. I accidentally stumbled into mo ...