The Doctor
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Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Saturday, May 2, 2009
One Half Hour
Half Hour.
One half hour before Christian was hit by the white, silver trimmed 1984 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, he was sitting bored between his little brother and mother as she talked to her friend Mary about how the President of their school's PTA was driving her crazy sending out emails and calling twice a day acting as if she were a dictator, not just another mom with not enough to do, and even though he felt too old he used one of the three green crayons the waitress gave him to color on the piece of paper with a poorly photocopied picture of a pirate ship that said "Pirete's Cove," misspelled with nothing on it that seemed cove-like which he's seen once when they went to see Nana in Florida and they had gone out on the Catamaran to the Keys looking for Mermaids in the cove on an island that was so small he could run all the way around it in just a few minutes.
One half hour later as the Monte Carlo turned into the yellow striped crosswalk at the intersection of Montana Boulevard and 22nd Street, its tires made no noise but the impact of the small boys body against the black-smeared bumper was a clear, sharp thwump that turned heads for several blocks in either direction anxiously away from their latte's, chicken caeser salads, Christmas/Hanakah/Kwanzaa shopping excursions, and the commercial photo shoot on the sidewalk outside Angelica's Couture among the nonseasonal dresses and airy thin Hermes scarves, the photographer not noticing the image he captured of Christian's brown right shoe suspended in the air over his young model's thin, ivory white shoulder some 30 feet from where the Monte Carlo screeched to a halt.
One half hour before getting in his car, Emir was laughing in a booth in the back room at Canter's Deli on Fairfax wishing he had not gotten the piece of apple pie but eating it anyway in spite of the hard time Goran and David had given him for his ample stomach which bubbled up through his blue cotton blend oxford shirt and over the top of his tan straight leg Docker's. He ate the ice cream that melted next to it even though he knew it would make him phlegmy and almost certainly make him snore and his wife would ask if he had eaten dairy; he knew that he couldn't lie to her, couldn't even try, she could see it a mile away like the time before they were married and he slept over at David's because he was so drunk he couldn't get off the couch let alone sleep and she had known he wasn't at his mother's house. She knew and he promised himself he would never lie to her again and on their wedding night as they made love in his mother-in-law's guest house, he promised himself he would always be faithful as he struggled to push the image of his wife's best friend touching his thigh with her foot at the reception dinner.
In half an hour, on the ground as he wailed, staring at the limp body of Christian cradled in the arms of his mother, a woman so calm so peaceful she could have been a painting a Raphael, a Michelangelo, a perfect Pieta, as he stared the snot and fear poured from his body, and the engine of the Monte Carlo purred so lightly, he kept it in good shape, always did the right thing, changed the oil used good gas, and so it purred but he didn't hear it for the pure sound of anguish that shot forth from his heart at the speed of life.
©2009 alan caudillo Sphere: Related Content
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
B-girl trailer
This is the trailer for a little Dance movie I recently shot. Very fun to make, check it out: click the title above to go to their website.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
10 things you should know about Obama's plan (but probably don't)
10 things you should know about Obama's plan (but probably don't)
The plan:
1. Makes a $634 billion down payment on fixing health care that will go a long way toward paying for a more efficient, more affordable health care system that covers every single American.3
2. Reduces taxes for 95% of working Americans. And if your family makes less than $250,000, your taxes won't go up one dime.4
3. Invests more than $100 billion in clean energy technology, creating millions of green jobs that can never be outsourced.5
4. Brings our troops home from Iraq on a firm timetable, finally bringing the war to a close—and freeing up almost ten billion dollars a month for domestic priorities.6
5. Reverses growing income inequality. The plan lets the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans expire and focuses on strengthening the middle class.7
6. Closes multi-billion-dollar tax loopholes for big oil companies. 8
7. Increases grants to help families pay for college—the largest increase ever.9
8. Halves the deficit by 2013. President Obama inherited a legacy of huge deficits and an economy in shambles, but his plan brings the deficit under control as soon as the economy begins to recover.10
9. Dramatically increases funding for the SEC and the CFTC—the agencies that police Wall Street.11
10. Tells it straight. For years, budgets have used accounting tricks to hide the real costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush tax cuts, and too many other programs. Obama's budget gets rid of the smokescreens and lays out what America's priorities are, what they cost, and how we're going to pay for them.12
click here for details
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Missing Stan Brakhage
I've been missing Mr. Brakhage of late as I struggle with the purpose of my art in this world....
Monday, February 23, 2009
some of my work, recap
Here is another look at my work, as with time one tends to forget. I'm in the process of updating, cutting some, and I have ALOT of new stuff to stick on, so any suggestions welcome!
Friday, February 13, 2009
man in the elevator
The tall man with the thick head of grey, curly hair stands silent and still in the elevator. He has on a brown overcoat, unbuttoned and without a belt. His black, freshly polished left shoe is untied. He looks but does nothing. In his left hand he holds a brown paper bag. The bag holds groceries. A loaf of whole grain, vitamin enriched bread in a clear plastic bag with white writing on a purple background is visible at the top.
The tall man sighs, and shifts the brown paper bag to his right hand, and with his left index finger presses the button for the 4th floor, three times in succession, then sighs again.
The elevator door closes, and begins to move. P1. L. 1. 2. 3. The elevator stops with a lurch, and the lights flicker on and off, then on again. He briefly puts his left hand on the bronze mirrored wall to steady himself. The gold band on his ring finger clicks loudly on the glass.
The man pushes the button marked "alarm" with his left index finger. It fails to light up. He pushes first the L button, then each successive button until all have been pushed. He shifts the brown bag to his left hand and opens the gold colored panel beneath the rows of buttons. He grabs the black phone inside and puts it to his right ear. The ear has a small hole where an earring would be. A man's basso voice comes through the phone.
"Yeah, security."
The tall man clears his throat and says, "Uh, I'm in the uh, elevator. It's stuck."
The tall man puts the bag down and presses the 4th floor button with his left hand. The lights flicker, and the elevator resumes moving up, quickly coming to a stop. The doors open onto the fourth floor.
"Never mind.'
The tall man hangs up the phone and closes the small door. He stands up, looks at himself in the mirror, picks up the bag with his left hand and leaves.
Monday, February 2, 2009
reaching for the sun
With my left hand I grasp for the space left behind by the Sun.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
MLK in LA
MLK. alan caudillo
My wife and children and I make the trek in the family station wagon to the parade celebrating the birth of Martin Luther King, jr. Because of the parade, we must park several blocks from the parade route, MLK boulevard from Leimert Park to Western, in the heart of the hood.
We had expected a joyous time, the following day was the inauguration of Mr. Obama, and we wanted our children of color to have a memorable experience. It was a sad occasion for me. There were cops, tense and edgy, on both sides of the street, twenty feet apart facing the crowd for the entire parade.
Instead of celebration and pride, there was a great deal of living down to cultural stereotypes; children smoking blunts, while holding their even younger children, as they yelled into the cell phones "nigger, this the stupid fuckin' thing I seed."
The night before, we watched the stars come out and perform in Mr. Obama's honor. We cried as we hopefully awaited a new day. My wife saw a friend, Arno, performing with James Taylor, and only a few months ago she bumped into him, broke, working for peanuts as an extra on a long canceled TV show, and she weeped in happiness for him as he sang his heart out for the President.
For nearly the whole performance, a young girl slept behind the President-Elect and slept. It is and not the reality of the parade I held in my mind when I wrote this poem.
While the world watches
the change that has come a
child sleeps peacefully.
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