May 11, 2005
By Kevin Feeney
HEY-YO it’s springtime, my dear seashells, and the colors are popping like paintball pellets: salty white blossoms drip-dropping on Harvard’s chemically-hued lawns. I picked up the LifeReel from my university-assigned mailbox the other day. Orientation week, I forgot to mention, first thing I did was drop by Harvard University Health Services (HUHS) for my Incision. A grad student at the Med School named Patsy strapped me to a cold hospital bed, and following the surgical path she mapped out with a blue Sharpie, slit open a hole at the tip of my eyelid where she inserted the LifeReel, a microscopic spindle of film that loops around my head recording my every thought and action. Two days ago Patsy removed the LifeReel with a sharp, fang-like tool she called FerretClaw and passed it on to the Visual and Environmental Studies (VES) Department, where six talented undergraduates with ripped jeans and yellow fingernails cut and spliced my life, or rather, the last two months of it, into a 32-minute short film, whose title, The Fall of Rome, remains an inside joke they have yet to share with me. Today, for the first time, we will be screening the film. So please turn off your cell phones and keep your eyes on the screen, my little cranberries.
SCENE ONE
The scene: A room in the Phillips Brooks House, Harvard’s community service nexus. The first meeting of the Harvard Korean Adoptee Mentorship Program, a service project that connects adopted Korean children with their heritage.
It starts with a broken spoon. I take the broken spoon’s nose and balance it on my own (zoom in, so close you can see inside my pores and out again). My circus act distracts eight-year-old Aidan from the task at hand – making kimbab, the Korean equivalent to sushi. Aidan takes the broken spoon and balances it on his nose for a very impressive length of time, much longer than even I had managed. Then he steadies the spoon on his wrist, and afterwards on his head, laughing all the while. I steal the spoon from him and he chases me around the room, both of us on all fours. By this point, he has forgotten about kimbab. We have forgotten ourselves. We are dinosaurs; he, a T-Rex, and I, a Triceratops. We roar and roll around the carpet (start musical montage: Bossa Nova’s “Meditaço”). Aidan claws at me as we transmogrify from dinosaurs to a 747 airplane headed for Chicago O’Hare International Airport. Aidan becomes the wings, I become the cabin. We are flying on multicolored carpet that strangely resembles the landscape of the earth when you look down on it from miles above, pressing your nose against the cabin window, wondering if, by some miraculous chance, you’ll ever meet one of those red dots down below. The other kids join us, splitting into single-passenger fighter jets, and I morph into the landing pad, wide and vulnerable. When I emerge from the pile of tiny human airplanes, my friend Cat tells me I’m bleeding from my lip (end musical montage with DJ scratch). I brush my hand across my face and my finger smears red. To wide-eyed Aidan I say no, this is not blood, it is pen, red pen that must have come from my name tag when we were playing dinosaurs. Aidan giggles and, I assume, doesn’t give it a second thought. He grabs a dry-erase marker and decides to cover my face in polka-dotted chicken pox.
My voice slows and we cut now to shots from around the world: Soldiers arise and wipe the pen off their chests, graves rattle, killers drop their washable markers. Victims of chemical warfare ask their doctors why they have highlighter on their faces and they scrub themselves clean. A bomb incites a third-grade finger-painting session—the landscape exploding in primary colors—and Aidan and I, in the middle of it all, ooh-and-ahh like proud and hopeful parents.
SCENE TWO
Scene: Let’s Go office. Let’s Go is a student-run travel guide company. I edit the Ireland guide with Rachel, a higher-ranking and far more qualified sophomore, but in this particular scene I use the office for other purposes.
By the phone (it is dark: turn on the spotlights), I am waiting with Adam, a former rowing champion of the universe who is also my friend. Adam and I have a conference call at eight with Ann and Teri from 826 Seattle to discuss our plans to set up an 826 in Boston. This summer Adam will intern at 826 Valencia, and I will stay in Cambridge working weekdays for Let’s Go but also starting to get 826 Boston off the ground by getting to know the local school system. We get a ring (beep-beep, beep-beep) from Ann on our fancy speaker phone. Bad news: Teri will be a few minutes late because her home in Seattle, it turns out, has been infested by bees. Quite impressively, Teri gets on the line no more than ten minutes later, still fending off a slew of bees zipping around her home, to narrate her story of opening an 826 in Seattle.
Hold on, she says, I bet you can hear them. (Cut to Teri, in Seattle, holding the phone up to the bee swarm.)
I do hear something, but cannot distinguish phone static from genuine bee buzzing.
What kind of bees are they?
Italian, Teri says. I thought that sounded kind of exotic, but it turns out, she says, Italians are the most common bees. Completely regular, she says.
Teri tells us how she began 826 Seattle, interviewing local students, applying for non-profit status, assembling a board (cut to shots of the forty-page 826 Seattle business plan, a hulking document that outlines the project from beginning to end). Now, a year later, after countless donor house parties and planning meetings, 826 Seattle is set to open in the late summer. Teri offers us her support in the coming months, as we begin to follow her path for 826 Boston, and we say thank you very much, email us those documents, and it was great to meet you, however impersonal this phone conference may be—
And as we talk, a cartoon cuts in, set in a giant beehive, with five or six bees, the queen included. In barges a whole troupe of humans who look just like me. They chatter, say hello, how are you, nice to meet you, let me tell you about college. They bump into each other, follow symmetric paths. The queen bee, draped in royal garb, asks (buzzes): What kind of humans are they? Her lackey says, they are Feeney humans. The queen says, sounds exotic. Her lackey says, not really. They are the most common type of human. Completely regular. At this news the Italian bees charge the Feeney humans and sting them left and right. The Feeney humans hit the sticky floor of the beehive all at once and say, in unison, pleeeasseee, no more. The queen bee chuckles, says, how original, and we cut to commercial break.
COMMERCIAL
Scene: In front of the Chino Latino restaurant in Bayamón, Puerto Rico. This scene features only the father of my friend who hosted me during my stay there over spring break.
Says the father to the guest: You must come back. Like Arnold Schwarzenagger says, “I’ll be back.” Say it, come on. That a boy. I’ll take you to the beach next time. Nowadays I leave the office at 11 in the morning. No problem. I tell the boss, I’ve got business to take care of. What do you expect? I’ve been there for 25 years, in the Army. Now’s my time to relax. I tell him, I gotta go, and I head to the beach. The women are so, so beautiful. And what they wear—well. If you need a chaperone, I will be the chaperone. No problem.
SCENE 3
Scene: Inside the Paradise Rock club. Scout Niblett is performing. I’m with Jack, Gabriel, Kristi and Nina.
It is dark and musky inside the Paradise Rock club on my second visit here. (Flashback, cut to: the beautiful and keytar-playing lead singer of Vagenius, the distant stares of the Kings of Leon, the determination of the wheelchaired man to make his way to the front row of the crowd.) Tonight we’re here to see The Kills, a husband-wife or maybe boyfriend-girlfriend rock duo, but first we must enjoy or maybe endure Scout Niblett. Scout Niblett looks like an oversized Raggedy Ann doll, except with poofy blond hair. The dress works, though. Her voice, high and creepy, is captivating for its very highness and creepiness. Now for her big hit:
We’re all gonna die, she sings, over and over, sort of sing-songy. We’re aa-all gonna die.
Gabriel, to my right, fades into the Dark and Musky. So does the couple in front of me, and the couple next to them, and the crazy man behind me. Jack, Nina and Kristi poof away like dustclouds. And Scout Niblett evaporates, leaving only her voice behind. I, too, am left behind. I remain with only the girl next to me, the girl I do not know, the girl with the brown hair and the big black eyes. She has aged, and so have I. She is 79. I am 80, give or take a year. We dance the foxtrot or maybe a waltz. I make a joke about time, and she smiles and sighs. We float above the floor and shimmy a little to the nasally voice of Scout Niblett. I complain about my bad knees, worn from two surgeries and the weight of blissful experience.
SCENE FOUR
Scene: A montage of Harvard’s new Experiential Learning Program.
The Magic School Bus can shove it. We’ve got a Magic Teleporter. Name a place, a state of mind, and we will be there. We learn counterculture with Ken Kesey and talk globalism with activists in the Bolivian cocalera movement. We are in Darfur and Rwanda. We know how to bandage wounds and we are learning how to love in every country. To us borders are like hopscotch lines on a blacktop and we are reeling dancers.
The scene trails off, because it is fundamentally untrue. There is no such program at Harvard. But—imagine.
SCENE FIVE
Scene: A children’s hospital. Following a performance of Storytime Players, a Harvard-affiliated children’s theater group that performs the student-written production “A Fish Tale” at various hospitals and service organizations.
I am still wearing my costume—the garb of Owen the Octopus, Surfer-Dude Radio DJ. That means I have on a purple T-shirt with six large, spiky arms attached. A very vocal young boy has just finished fingerpainting my face (flashback to the show, the young boy screaming loudly, Hello!, as I entered stage left). The girl I say hello to now does not respond. From her hospital bed she looks toward the ceiling, toward the fluorescent lights up above.
How did you like the show? I ask.
No answer.
What’s your name? I ask. Mine’s Kevin.
No answer.
She raises her hand, slowly, limply, from the hospital bed. I take her hand, unsure if that is what she wants. She squeezes back tightly. (In truth, it really hurts. I admit it was probably the most painful thing I’d endured in quite a while.) Then she lets go, I say goodbye, and pack up my octopus costume.
We close this scene with images and sounds of things we do not understand. A lonely man pounding away at his drum. The soft light that comes through the window on a San Francisco morning. Your laugh, etc. My mumbling, etc. His eyes, etc. Her resignation, etc. Etc.
THE END
OKAY, little peppermints, that is the end of the film. Now it’s time for audience questions. Ask anything you want and I promise to answer. Here we go.
Don’t I find the film rather disjointed?
I accept full responsibility for this one. The smart people at the Visual and Environmental Studies Department worked long and hard to create a cohesive work of art, and I worked only minimally to translate the film onto paper. I had many distractions this Sunday morning, like lunch, showering, an outdoor Harvard Square concert featuring The Walkmen and State Radio, a phone call from my father, etc. Plus I have no rhythm, and dancing and writing are close cousins.
Was mofongo con carne my favorite dish on my trip to Puerto Rico?
Yes, it was.
What if every person in the world was paired with another person, and every year they painted each other’s portraits, and all those portraits were used to cover skyscrapers and park benches and soon enough, the world was covered in these portraits, with faces of the past floating in the wind?
That would be neat.
Do I have a pet?
Of course. His name is Leonard and he is a beta fish. I bought him yesterday with my dear friend Areli. A fun fact about Leonard is that he likes to swim around his castle. A fun fact about Areli is that she likes tulips. Having a fish around is a lot of work, as I tend to stare at him for hours at a time. I also ask him tons of questions, like, Will I ever get married? He answers all right, quite confidently, but I am still learning the language.
Did I know that many of the world’s most accomplished painters had lazy eyes?
Yes, I did. I read that in the newspaper this morning. Makes sense.
Where will I be living next year?
In Quincy House, one of the upper-class “residential colleges.” I entered the housing lottery with four other people. Here they are:
Gabriel: I’ve mentioned him before. He’s Brazilian, co-edits The Goose, is a pretty mediocre tennis player.
Nina: Reminds me of California. She is very interested in everything and will therefore live an incredibly fulfilling life.
Deanna: One of the funniest people I know. She also takes an unusual amount of interest in the dining hall’s weekly menu.
Ting-Ting: A capella singer, sculptor. I might also call her goofy. I don’t even feel stupid using the word “goofy.”
How are my classes going?
Very well, thank you. Three final papers coming up, and one final exam, but hey, I’ve deconstructed American drug policy and devoured a good chunk of sixties lit, so I’m feeling good about myself.
What does my theme song sound like?
Skippy-doo-wop-bodop-eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-dooooo. Bah bah bah. Skippy-doo-wop. Bah bah bah. Bang bang. Blat blat skippy-dooo. Eeeee. Wah-wah-doooo-deee-dooo.
That is what I hear all day long.
Have I been to any good events recently?
David Rees, Todd Solondz, Jonathan Safran Foer, Steve Almond speaking engagements. An incredible Brazilian music showcase, and then later an Afro-Cuban sing-along. A director-in-person screening of Control Room. More, more, more.
Have I found love?
No.
Have I achieved utter happiness?
I’m waiting.
Peace?
I’m waiting.
Bliss?
I’m waiting.
Have I found my passion, the thing that will forever sustain me?
I don’t know. But I think I’m on the verge of something big. As I sit here right now, unkempt and unshowered as I am, I feel deconstructed, if that concept even applies to humans. I feel drained. But it is May, the year is almost over, and I am also strangely hopeful. I feel it when I breathe deeply, when I stand outside in that spring rain, soaking. Words mean more to me now. I write them down in a notepad. I copy phrases I like:
Rafael Casal: “It was so deceiving to see you defeat the meaning of what we should’ve been could’ve been if you’d treated me decent we could’ve been easily living inside of a tree / just so we could breathe together better ‘cause we right beside the breeze.”
Memorias del Subdesarollo: “I am like a plant. All leaves and no fruit.”
And so on.
I need to run, or dance. I’d like to fly a kite. I’d like to read a book on my own accord. It’s all possible, though. I’ve never been so aware of movement.
With gusto,
Kevin Feeney & Leonard
