one of the simplest motions is the lever.
levers work by translating a small force into a larger motion — called leverage. mathematically the work remains the same, sum total, but through the use of levers through time, a smaller force applied over a longer period of time is easier for human beings to achieve motions which would be more difficult to apply directly. one of the key facets of levers involve the prime fundamental force, which helps structure the entire universe — namely gravity. levers could still work even if gravity did in fact not exist, as the force needs to be applied throughout the beam which acts as an amplifier. an interesting application of this happens in snowboarding, when the snowboarder stands at the fulcrum and adjusts her weight to and fro, in order to direct the force down the mountain. what’s tricky about the application is that part of the direction relies heavily on the traction between the board and the mountain. the snowboarder isn’t just deploying her own body as an amplification through the board but the constant change in the packed-ness of the mountain and the slope of the mountain also increases or decreases the amplification. if you hold the board and the mountain as two stable variables, you can see the little shadow grow bigger on one side or the other. this isn’t true to life though, since we are talking about a single axis with a stick — the human body is a more complex shape.
susan would write all these equations on the blackboard, working through variables in her math class. what’s absolutely astounding, she said, is that after a few trials of falling down, you intuitively grasp the physics. these equations become second nature to you, she said. for all our deliberate graspings of these complex equations, there isn’t anything for what happens in muscle memory. you learn quickly, or at least i did, she said, that tightening one muscle in your calf, or in your thigh can be enough to change direction
all these flew through her head, and out the proverbial window, though, when one winter day she tried to carve over a rather large ice patch and her board slipped out from under her. she over compensated and flipped over, flying in the wrong direction. she saw for a brief second a tree in her near future. she planted her feet down, forcing her board into the side of the mountain, wanting to cut deep into the ice and force a radical turn left, back onto the path. conditions that day were dire for her already — it had stopped snowing for a week already, and the constant sunshine had melted the snow which re-iced in the cold night that followed. this happened for 8 days already.
so the snow she cut into was hard, and she forced her board in too deeply, causing her board to lock. she didn’t have room to complete her fall though — the tree was right there.
when she came to, she was heavily bandaged and there were restraints on her body. she was groggy already. where? what? who? her left arm was somewhat unrestrained so she groaned and reached up, only so far before sharp pain forced her to relax. her boyfriend was there. yes, she had slammed into the tree. yes, she was in the hospital. she wanted to talk but her mouth was locked. don’t move, he said. i’m here. you were out for two days — your parents are flying in tomorrow. just relax. i’ll be here.
lucky the school had great insurance for their professors. and she had recently become tenured. so the months that followed were a slow progression for doctors in the dark. at first, she was worried she would not walk again. they said, no that wasn’t it — her spine was fine. she had changed her fall to the right in the last second and avoided the trunk, which would have probably snapped her spine should she had hit it full on… but in her change she hit a low hanging branch and that knocked her out. she could see herself drawing our her accident on a chalkboard, explaining the entire thing to a class of disinterested students. yes, she would have to revisit the spot, first chance she got, to take measurements and figure out exactly what the slope was and which direction she was going. in fact, susan? susan? hm, she asked. sorry, i wasn’t listening. there was a long silence, and she sensed something was wrong.
the point? she may not see again.
her chalkboard dreams disintegrated back into darkness.
but they will have to run some tests and wait, let her body heal some more.
there wasn’t much else to it. some glimmer of hope evaporated slowly in the ensuing weeks. when she was released, she could not believe it; she had to use a cane, sweeping it to find her way around.
with that, her remarkable future as a math teacher seemed another world. her upcoming vacation to morocco next year? the last thing on her mind. her devoted bf would go to the other way, in the hallway and whisper with doctors. tell her, we’ll get through this, somehow. her parents, her mother’s hand on her forehead, her father holding her hand. she was an only child, and they stayed way too long. what’s all this whispering business? what’s all this poor susan business? what’s all this darkness?
there’s not much to a blackboard without chalk. so her math musings were like so many fingernails trying to scratch an x on what was blackness. only a blackboard isn’t truly black. it’s kind of a green-black, so she always thought, but now, there’s not even that. this blackboard has no equation. she couldn’t carve an x into this darkness for anyone, let alone carve a sharp turn in some fucking ice patch. she had stayed an extra few days too, extended her trip since the hotel offered a deal since ppl were leaving. the slope was bad, so froze and packed, only the experienced daredoers stayed. and those years and years of practice, fun, and all the bruises and the few broken bones here and there — for this?
she would never drive again.
she would have to take the crappy almost non-existent public transit. one of her first trips was to the beach.
from here, her bf told her how beautiful coronado island was, how she could see it. hear the seagulls, hear the ocean, small the salt. hear the children and the far off sandrake the city of san diego dragged across the beach to keep the sand loose and smooth, cool under her feet, freshly raked sand.
she wouldn’t go into the water, except with a heldhand. she could only see the beach in her head. sometimes she saw things at night, or saw her bfs or someone’s expression, filled in, and she would unconsciously mistake her imagination for vision, smiling when she heard the street vendor’s voice, imagining him like mario from mario brothers, with a thick bushy mustache. she asked her bf if he looked like that, and he sounded funny when he said that the man did look like that. she played this game for a while, hearing a woman talk sternly to her child, and seeing a thick redheaded woman until she walked into the one too many chairs, thinking the pond smaller than it was, and she fell over spraining her ankle in the fountain, pennies sliding under her fingers like so many bumpy equations hidden in the thick darkness like a gigantic patch of ice over everything again.
they had been an outdoorsy couple, despite her nerdy inclination to make everything into an equation. they loved to go surfing, or golfing, snowboarding, hiking in the hills, or out in the desert. she would map out the arc of balls, draw fourier transformations on napkins so she could rape him at pool. (he would complain but if she used the math she would always win.) how like a dream now! they used to camp overnight, make love under the stars. and came back covered in dust to sit naked together, after a hot shower, to watch the tv. all of that paradise was so far away now. they couldn’t do the tv thing.
at first he was more than attentive, but then as she dispassionately predicted, he came by less and less after work. she still taught, but could not grade papers. she had to work doing something else, with a TA. she went on disability. she stayed at home, sleeping odd hours. her phone would ring, if she remembered to plug it in, and she learned her apartment by the shape of her body, the space she fit herself into between the toilet and the shower, between the kitchen and the oven was three susans. her couch was two susans from the sliding glass door.
she burned her fingers trying to cook. so she left the radio on, softly and held the handle. the radio sound did not matter. they could talk of the presidential election, the serial rapist, or some celebrity bullcrap it was the same drone to her as she stir a curry mix until it smelled a certain way, careful not to burn herself… her pots must look terrible, full of burn marks, and other odd grossnesses…
the microwave was touch pad, and her bf glued dots to the buttons, so she could cook her food properly. after an undercooked this, a burnt that…
she felt him as a smell, an obelisque on the horizon, dark and small and then smaller and darker until it was only night. she wasn’t sure what time anything was, without feeling the sun on her skin. she left the curtains open a crack so she could feel the heat.
until she realized was it a day ? a week? two weeks? he did not come by. she called him and there was no answer. a message, and… no return call. nothing.
a small nothing, in a big gigantic void of nothing.
suicide was a small thought somewhere. her parents said she should come back to them, but she loved that apartment. she couldn’t afford it. the disability services ppl wanted to teach her how to subsist on routine and fixed dimensions. the entire globe became the shape of her street block, like the back of her head, or the small between the toilet and the sink.
if she dropped her toothbrush in the bowl, she knew where it would lie, and she knew how far her hand was from the rim. her parents bowl? how big was that? how smooth was that?
she was wasting away, with her cell phone dead somewhere. she tossed it into some obscure corner. she was sure it broke, it sounded like it. and something weird and crunchy lay under her feet by the front door.
she wasn’t sure where her duvet lay, she slept under a sheet, with a towel and her jacket. what color was this towel? was it the blue one or one of the ones with animal prints?
then one day it happened.
she thought it a dream, a face like mario from mario brothers, the street vendor but with a yellow hat staring down at her. so startling she forgot she was blind and screamed, turning her head to the side, what was this man doing so close to her face?
but she could not get away. she screamed and bolted to her side until she realized that she was face planted in a mysterious pillow on the floor beside her bed and this face still filled her field of vision.
still this vaguely terrified her, after seeing nothing for so long and she wept a little into the pillow, feeling the chilly floor sweep into her back and sides. she recalled this was winter, heard somewhere on the radio, and it was about a year since that fateful accident.
she stretched out, banging her elbow on her bed and the face spin slightly and winked at her.
she tried, experimented with turning her head, reaching her hands out and this face, too close for comfort was still there. her hands, she did not see her hands. was there sunlight? she found and hit her clock and it told her it was 3:45pm on tuesday, january 3rd.
it was the beginning of the FACE the era of its eyes, two black holes, a blackhole mouth with blackhole nostrils, dark hair, busy mustache, yellow cap like one of those taxi drivers from movies in the 60s.
this was so odd and terrifying at once, she could not ignore it. when she turned on her favorite radio station, this face danced around a little, wriggling though it lacked body and neck. she thought she could see every little pore in its sink, see every eyelash on its eyes. it could be more handsome. who are you, she asked, her voice crackling from lack of use. the face winked at her again.
she thought she could see her reflection in its eyes, but she could not peer closer into to see, as FACE existed as contact lenses do, independent of where she moved her head or her body.
whatever. add to my misery.
as though she lost a tooth. it used to be there, her mouth was the same and now it’s not. she’s toothless and must continue to eat and live life this way.
or like blindness.
after a day though, she was screaming at it, throwing things around, the FACE grinning and winking at her as though it understood her. but then it did not. it danced around, random. it made a kissy face as if mocking her. then she heard knocking noises. is that you she screamed stop a very muffled voice answered back and the FACE made a gesture with its eyes and tilted the chin. who are you she asked again.
this is the police. police? yes open up. are you okay, miss …. she had a strange revelation she almost fell over, someone was at the door. the police were at the door! yes yes sorry officer, everything is fine she said hoarsely, cracking the door open. she thought they were shining a flashlight in her eyes, she was sure of it, but she is blind and had no idea if they were. we heard screaming is everything okay? we had a complaint of noise. it’s 5am, miss. yes, sorry, everything is okay, i just thought someone was in here. do you mind we look around? no i’d rather you didn’t (you might take something from me, or move something and i would never find it again, probably trip over it.) well this is your first warning. we can walk around the perimeter if you like.
she got them to go away. and decided to keep her illness to herself. she laughed a little, cried a little and the FACE winked at her its grin both toothy and toothless. okay okay, so you need a name after all. lets call you… mac. you look like a mac. as if in agreement, so the mustache wriggled.
mac did not disappoint. a week later, she noticed he tilted a certain way when she was in the bathtub. she could not play with herself anymore, she found too, with this FACE always looking and jiggling.
what a turn off.
and when wanting to drink milk, mac seemed annoyed. she sniffed it. called on her neighbor and asked when does this expire? it’s been expired a week…
she went to the store, and found that when going down the milk aisle, mac bristled. where is the milk? there is no milk. the store is remodeling. how could she get milk? could you help me, she said, i need these items, and i can’t see…
it was odd talking to the employee, as she felt she was talking to mac. and mac seemed to dance quite a bit, in conversation.
she decided to move in with her parents.
she had to. she had no income. she did not tell them about mac, but one by one she learned is movements. if she moved slowly enough, he was consistent. when she was going to run into something he did a look. when she was reaching for her drink and it was not there, he made a face. she talked to a man, and mac seemed alarmed, disturbed. she tried to excuse herself even though he seemed nice enough, and he protested, started to get rough with her, mac made a face and she knew he was going to put his hand over her mouth so she kicked at him, or at least mac gestured in such a way so as to suggest kicking at him… there
he ran away when someone came running by, and the police were called, he matched the serial rapist description. are you okay miss? yes, i am, sorry, no its okay i don’t need to go to the police my parents number is xxx.xxx.xxxx please call them,
and so she learned to read mac, or rather he taught her. mysterious teaching, but she had nothing else to do. mysterious looking, yes there seemed to be mysterious packages in the living room. her parents looked at each other. can you… see, susan? no no, i just… it’s my birthday and you were acting strange, she lied. yes, they are for her, and her dad laughed, she was adjusting okay.
when opening, she noticed dispassionately that they had still gift-wrapped the packages. no, it didnt feel like newspaper… she was sure the wrapping paper had a blue ribbon pattern so said mac… but she said nothing, asked, what does this gift paper look like…
blue ribbon…
maybe she should get off disability?
she took a trip on the bus to downtown one day, and knew how far the bus stop was, and mac’s tiny face seemed the entire expanse of the world, the colors in his skin telling her where to put her foot, and she marched up stairs and did not trip, knowing where everything was, how far the railing went, and that she was in front of a large building and that building was a grocery store.
so this discrimination went, and she could find her jacket where it was moved, whether it was night or day until one day her parents said, it’s just like you got your vision back!
i guess so, susan admitted. i should go back to work. she had a hard time reading, but it came slowly until one day she was walking down the campus to her class when a former student ran into her and said wow, ms kirkpatrick, i haven’t seen you in a long time.
yes — i … had an accident. i was blind for a while… they talked for a bit and she marveled at the marble whiteness, the faded dust along the edge of the wall. that was 6 years ago… and… where’s mac?
she didn’t see a face anymore, she saw the birds flying over head, the color of the trees as they swayed like so in the invisible but felt wind. she thought maybe his mustache extended the sidewalk, and maybe she was under his left eye? but then it was gone and she only saw the world, as placid as his winking eye.
wherever she went, she strained to see him, no longer drawing equations to describe the flight of birds, or how a skateboard can jib on a railing, how the skate bumps can decrease speed given how far apart spaced they are… she thought she saw his face in a student’s face, and she stared too long at the student that the student looked away embarrassed.
she felt like carmen electra in the movie the box, a professor with a secret club foot. she thought she walked with a strange internal limp, thought for a minute that the sky was a lip, a twisting of the nose in a sneer for a minute, and that familiar winking she thought she remembered but she could not picture at all; the pores on her skin lighting up in the setting sun, an iron chimney over the student union with the faint smell of korean bbq they are cooking something for the student event.
she could not shake how spaces in rooms felt like a skin, how her vision and how she touched everything as if through the filter of a tv screen that remained the same so that we forgot it was there, and then we were in the tv. and having slipped through that looking glass, unable to see the screen again, unless someone were to blind herself again, as if shining a light on the tv from behind the viewer, so one could see the shadow, the outline of his face.
there were days she could not see him at all, seeing only a field of things like tron, like the wireframe of a renaissance painting shocking through everything in those measured lines. she hurried along towards the horizon at breakneck speed, thinking perhaps, i can find the vendor who sounded like him, the street vendor whose voice i might recognize a mac…
was mac, was mac god?
did she see her in blindness the skin of his face, winking at us, supplementing for us as newborn infants the rest of the world, when in mother’s womb dad shines a flashlight through the naval so that our dark wet world becomes a crowded web of veins and arteries through which we might poke at small intenstinal lining as a series of tubes that wrap us when we sleep, piping that we will never remember again, and the smell of the amniotic fluid, both the taste of mother’s saltine p.h. and mixed with our own nose and mouth.
she drove her car to the beach and then walked around, looking at the island. drove to ski park and rented a snowboard since she did not bring one.
they looked at her funny people did, i don’t have a ski jacket she said. in her trousers and blouse, shivering she sat in ski lift 2 in chair 75 on her way to the top, behind her big bear lake, blue like the sky, with evergreens lining its outskirts. the lake big bear, like the big bear in the sky she knew was there, she watched stars with her x so often but a constellation could not see as the sun was too bright, burning out her memory.
she slid off the lift, angled it clumsily and fell, her naked arm burning against the soft snow, from shock and cold. she got back up, brushed the snow from her. people stared at this woman without snow pants, without a snow jacket. so out of practice. if she fell too many times, her blouse would get wet, turn transparent, maybe? she went down the same fated slope, carving around a tree. she never did revisit the spot like she had imagined in bed.
there was a turn. she thought this was the tree but something was not right.
she went all the way down, rode back up and down a different direction.
she fell a few times, and shivering got back in the lift. someone commented that she should go get a jacket, or you’ll freeze. teeth chattering she said i am alright.
she went back another way, and this was different too. she thought for a minute she saw the outline of an eye slipped down a loose patch and tumbled off the path into the snow that was not boarded on, that was not packed that was soft and filled her, she sunk up to her butt and she was so cold she unlocked her boots and hobbled out, her legs numb and stinging.
just then someone flew by, at a tangent to the general curve line, how the steepness of the curve could increase speed. the variables flew by her in a second and she was stunned with a cartesian map of the slope this was the direction! this was the way!
she climbed out of the bank and strapped her boots in bindings again, slid down and then she found a tree, sure this was the one. it had a fence around it. she wanted to touch it. she climbed around the fence, and hugged the tree, feeling its rough bark against her torso. she closed her eyes and saw the inside of her eyelids when she turned her face towards the sun, blinded in red, she thought she could see the inside, red like her blood, with some sharp relief of veins that blurred once her imagination faded, and warm, against the tree, intuitive, without graphing it she knew it well, mac, the face, the mountain with its matching stars. without mapping it, or measuring the slope she knew it, knew it without conscious deliberation, equations that melted in the sun like icing, so she no longer shivered, a uterine hug.
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