Stylish Transient: A Novel by DJ Rankin - HTML preview

CHAPTER FIVE

Critical Acclaim for Vagabond Chic

Amazing! A meta-nonfictional self-awareness run amok with twist after twist of twisted inside-outness. Thought provoking, inspiring, full of engaging characters doing interesting things, a good primer on the positive side of chosen homelessness and pop up community, direct action protest and disaster relief, alternative building methods, reservation life, vagabond cuisine and tons of sincerely comedic banter. A spiritual manifesto as the author uses dialog to wax philosophically while clever wordplay and lyrical phrasing polishes the prose.

Now for the sake of full disclosure, I must admit I know the author, kinda. I met PJ hitchhiking a few years back, he was hitching, I was driving from Albuquerque to Boston when I pulled up to a stoplight and see this cartoon in a homemade ragdoll costume asking only for the East Coast. It’s a long way for a short story and that hat looks like it could write a novel at least half as drawn out as this, may as well risk misadventure and open the door for this sketch book that just won’t quit.

My judge of characters put to the test, invited in unless I smell something a little bit off, but would you believe that this curbside philosopher was possibly the deepest thinker I have ever met and somehow seemed to have way more figured out about life then even my own paid program of early retirement.

We quickly clicked over musical taste and the flavors of Waffle House, wildly apparent his untamed imagination flourished with a freedom ungoverned by social construct, he had clearly grabbed the reins of his own creation and only took a hundred miles for me to agree with his insistence on our predestined connection.

‘The spiral of the spider,’ he would say, like the flattened fabric of spacetime flowing from all four directions of initial vibration, an electric grid for subsequent strands of experience

to build upon, the slightest tangled tingles perceptible to not only the webweaver herself but to any creature clever enough to not get lost in the thought of life stuck in another’s margin.

An enhanced sensitivity to the otherwise transparent quilt that ties every frayed edge into a singular scene of jigsaw paradise, heightened frequencies navigate the threadwork with little to no resistance, the poor souls unevolved enough to feel outside their own bubble still flail around butt naked, the entire web seeming unstable as it is shaken and stirred into this tortured trampoline of cowered chaos.

Every node of intersection a dew drop of refracted light upon an unseen mesh of fishnet nothingness, every dew drop a reflection of every other dew drop, within those reflections a nestled reflection of all the other dew drops once again, with reflections of every other dew drop inside each of those as well.

Every drop a unique taste of the rainbow, only understandable from within the footsteps of each incomparable context of intimate relation.

Contextual complexity of exotic disposition, like a run-on word of a lifetime sentence and I’m paraphrasing here but this bit would never make sense without a relentless dependence on a quite lovely cast of incredible people. Dotted I’s connect as the space between unveils the true subject of contemplation, a tightly bound stitching ensures depth to detail as each stroke of the pen opens that much more of the map to possibility.

It is no coincidence that a life unconstricted by the dollar leaves space in the budget to cultivate true community. With no time taken off for work there’s no need to put any moment on hold, wish-I-coulds replaced by ample room to nurture all angles of the dream with a lucidity capable of spontaneous discussion. Lifelong friends are understated as intimate bonds defy infinite dimension, every player equipped to manipulate the illusion of reality with the slightest tug of invisible twine.

Spiral of the spider like the flattened fabric of spacetime, a cosmic web that appears two-dimensional from a distance deeper than space, yet those trapped among her delicate folds feel fully engulfed by every up and down she has to offer, the

vastness of above seen below for details and are you ready to sign on the dotted line?

But what can you do with any of this? Not everybody can just quit their job and run off to join the circus with Bearded Ladypockets. There is too much here in the now to get caught up on whatever else is out there, best focus on the gift of your presence and not worry too much about any of that other stuff, but don’t worry about any of this stuff either, worries tend to seem a bit pointless once you have become fully immersed in a loving relationship with the universe. And if you are not quite there yet then no worries, it all seems to be working out at just the right time and it should be about time to be here soon.

“Yep, this is my stop, thanks for picking me up relative, I’ll see you next time.”

More from PJ Blankin...

an excerpt from

The Galaxy’s Guide to Hitchhiking

*******

“Is that it?” asked Annie. “That’s how it ends? All of that nonsense to say that it was never about any of it to begin with.

Just another idiot pretending to be an author, pretending not to be an author, pretending not to be an idiot, and yet he’s still somehow failing at all of it, all at once. Over and over we get smothered and covered with scattered angles of metaphoric dimension, we get it, the entire universe is some huge knotted up masterpiece while all we gotta do is play our tiniest violin with all our heart, but now as it comes down to the nitty gritty crunchtime he unties a slipknot of loose ends and leaves it up to the reader to choose their own adventure.

A cheap shot in the dark that merely hints at a slightest illumination, all that this creator of catastrophe seems to do is nudge his victims toward some internalized epiphany that was already inevitable without the copyright of any written word. A laughable sketch of conclusion as his self-absorbed comedy leaves any punchline up to your own interpretation, a good bit of observational humor lost on the quantumly clueless and if you don’t get it then you’re most likely the butt of the joke.

You. The you that is you, reading about yourself, caught between the lines of here and there, and nowhere in fine print did you sign up for any of this yet here you are, finally finished another rendition of what somebody else thinks you should be doing with your life. You should be living it is what you should be doing, not just reading about it. It might be a good day to die but it is a mighty fine day for not dying too, so what do you say we get you up off your ass and get back to it?”

“Are you done then?”

“Honey, I was done with this charade parade long before my monologue began.”

“Well good,” said Spaz, “So then can I get back to the part about the whole story being about me? Of course it wouldn’t make sense to you that I could find a deeper meaning within the subtext of a script directed my way by the very cosmos of my composition, a concentrated concoction chockful of exactly what I needed at the very moment I was ready for it, and man I needed it more than anything while I was in there, that place was tough mama.”

“Geez, I bet babe, so whatya say we make like a shotgun and blow this joint?”

“I’m down, I just wanna hide this jar over here real quick, don’t wanna get hemmed up in another misstitched sentence of wasted time.”

“Cut!” yelled the director.

*******

“Cut!” yelled the director, obviously in awe of such a stellar performance by yours truly.

“What the fuck was that?”

Or perhaps I’ve misconstrued the twinkle in his glare.

“We already talked about this a bunch of times, the line is not anything about blowing shotguns, it’s ‘Make like a feather and fly the coup.’ The entire theme of this tangled mess has been about floating with the flow, and the jail stuff works with the coup thing, and then Spaz’s line is ‘I’m down,’ like the fluffy little feathers on a pillow’s underside, it’s a whole level of the multistory that your fireside stoner humor is not quite sophisticated enough to comprehend.”

My first thought of course, what possible demographic is he expecting to come out and see this thing, or to even halfway binge it in the background noise of another room ordinarily reserved for entertainment. I mean, the whole piece preaches independence of the dollar and freedom from the press, plus half his fans probably don’t even have TVs. If you ask me,

making a movie out of a book like this makes about as much sense as casting two fictional characters to play the leads, but I’m just along for the ride and I’m mainly here for the snacks anyway.

“Reset the scene, and let’s try to get it right this time, so we can move on to the next set of things to try to get right that time, and maybe somehow we can climb out of this shipwreck unscathed. Other than all that mess, you two are doing stellar, obviously, but then again you are portraying yourselves, so it’s kinda like ‘What’s the big deal,’ right?”

[Lights fade as Camera B pulls back to expose our exterior dimension]

*******

Lights fade as Camera B pulls back to expose our exterior dimension. An accelerated zoom-out reveals that this entire production has existed entirely within a single drop of ink as the viewer comes to realize the expanse of inklings it took to fabricate such a tall tale and then to simply condense it to the papered-down version you have before you.

Lights return as we find ourselves eye to eye with the completed script, a parlor room fireplace alludes to a familiar ringing in the ears, a feedback loop of concentric eccentrics adjusts perceptions and the script tells us we’ve taken up yet another thread of our untethered timeline.

DIRECTOR

Alabama. Saving the turtles and all that. But in this scene Annie’s trying to talk spaz into leaving for Cop City.

ANNIE

(Puzzled)

Sorry, I’m kinda lost, so is this where they run into PJ?

DIRECTOR

Not yet. Not that they know of anyway. All they know by now is that some legendary dude and his sister had been helping with the salamanders until they took off for Atlanta, then there they’ll have narrowly missed paths once again as they only pick up a faint scent of the patchman passing through.

ANNIE

I’m excited for this whole part of it. And anxious. It’s gonna be tough immersing myself in the intensity of what resistance camps are all about, and the escalated violence the other side has stooped to as they lose grip on a restless movement of awakening. I just hope I can capture a single drop of the magic and inspire even one wary traveler to enlist in the most transformative experience of their life.

DIRECTOR

Cue camera B panning to audience

CAMERA B PANS TO THE RIGHT

DIRECTOR

Slower

CAMERA B SLOWS PAN

Background sets break away as we move behind the scene DIRECTOR

That’s it, go ahead Annie

ANNIE

There are pockets of activity all over and more ways to get involved than ever, the time for wishing you could has come and gone, don’t put it off until you wish you had.

Camera B slows pan to a stop on an empty director’s chair personalized only as “YOU”

“And that’s pretty much the gist of it.”

*******

“And that’s pretty much the gist of it,” pitched PJ and the Pajama Party. “Followed of course by a psychedelic animation of extra credits and one final dig into the author’s earthhole.

Picture this, this picture that I am holding here offscreen, one single deck of cards, brand spanking new, perfectly crisp and calibrated for optimal performance and all neatly organized by octave in a Crayola spectrum of statistical utopia.

And then ‘Bam!’ or ‘Bang!’ or whatever it was, its a big boom of fifty-two card pickup, plus the jokers, but you don’t have to say them, it’s all a big clusterfuck of discombobulation and your girlfriend’s pissed as fuck at you, but it is quite clear how this infinite tension can swell until something’s gotta give.

Then a glowing mirage of chaos ensues as comedic situations shuffle and reorganize through nearly endless gameplay, until the last pixel falls perfectly into place, and here all of a sudden everything clicks the pen as the final secret of the metaverse is exquisitely unveiled.”

“Brilliant,” cheered a high-powered Hollywood executive,

“At least it was the first dozen times you bulldozed your great idea across my face, and the answer’s still a big fat no. It’s just a basketcase of two-dimensional characters squatting inside a multi-story dwelling, it's all PJs and BJs and who in their right mind would root for a hero as absently absurd as this one?”

“And that’s pretty much the gist of it.”

*******

“And that’s pretty much the gist of it.” I said, knowing full well the odds of a publisher’s interest in promoting a priceless dispersal of my unlisted catalog, which only made me freer to stick to my story even if it did come a little unglued around the seams.

“Brilliant,” cheered the low-level agent’s assistant on her third of four daily coffee runs, and always in disposable cups, she’d tried to persuade a policy of refreshment but fell flatter than Crystal Pepsi. “I completely loved all the quick flips at the end that tied everything up nice and neat, especially my cameo, you may just have forged a new degree of metatrash topping a squeaky wheeled cartful of discounted Walmart receipts.”

“How clever.”

“As was the finesse with which you found a way to update our whereabouts, of course Annie and Spaz’s prequel would filter through the horseback homestead from an earlier Eden, and of course up trots Chocolate Feather with none other than a cowboy-clad Wolf perched at the helm of his first solo sailing trip, and PJ’s long gone, and so that is you then, huh? You are Prairie Jesus?”

“Actually no,” I refused the resemblance as I held up my freshly frothed refill, “They call me Dairy Jesus. The other one is more of my live-action stunt double as I unpen myself from the page, but yeah, he’s pretty much me with a better tailor.”

“Well please do me a favor and let him know that I think it is awesome what he is doing by sharing this way of life with a most vital generation of our endangered species’ continued existence, a more-than-average year abroad for berries on the dollar, Earthwork and sacred rites and a rewilding of society, a life in service and action and gratitude for such an incredibly vast abundance. And I know ya’ll be eating good as hell out there, I wanna go.”

“And what did you say your name was again?” I casually asked as butterflies blew past my vocal cords.

Her response a simple smirk that said it all before she had to, a distinct sweetness obscured her role as keymaster not of this pretzeled puzzle, but of the entire construct within which any of it could ever exist, of course her name was...

*******

“Annie, wake the fuck up!” Roxanne shouted through the half-open doorway. “You’re gonna be late for work, third time this week and it is only Tuesday, and I know you know rent is due soon and need I remind you that you suck at adulting?”

“Holy shit girl that one was vivid as hell,” mumbled Annie as she swept the sleep from her face. “I was like some kind of hitchhiking forest gypsy, and you were there, crazy as a loon but definitely you, and everybody else we know had assumed names and feigned ignorance as they fleshed out the ensemble of my nocturnal whimsy. It was mainly just some sticks and rocks and inside jokes about people I don’t even know but somehow felt like I had known forever, a tale older than time without the constrictions of clocking in and who in the world would want to go to work when there is a whole planet full of revolution just around the corner?”

“Oh no you don’t. You are not going to sit there and talk yourself out of a job, again, and all because your dreams are more exciting than your cubicle. Nobody wants to get up and go to work, that’s the whole point, but it is just something we all have to do because that’s the way it is, so suck it up and put your fantasy on hold and maybe if you play your timecards right you might actually retire with enough energy for a nap.”

“See, even through your 3D glasses you know something isn’t right with this broken way of life, the one they somehow convinced us to believe an inevitable conclusion of artificially flavored intelligence, but I think we’re smarter than that. I’ve seen it in action, it may have been a dream, but what is any alternate reality but a collage of dreams brought to fruition by those bold enough to believe in them? Fiction or not, when something speaks to your heart in a way that fundamentally

shifts your perspective of existence it’s next to impossible to unknow what resonates as universal truth.”

“And let me guess, your truth is that you are not going to work today.”

“Well it wouldn’t be a very fulfilling character arc if I did, not after that whole closing argument and all, and how could we ever expect them to put down their preconceived motions and simply be here with us in the now? I would much prefer to spend this moment pouring color and beauty into the fountain, a kaleidoscope of vibrance spreading from my own internal light into the stagnation of the concrete world that engulfs me, a delicate visual both of how the power of love can conquer all and as we zoom out from the city’s grid we understand that pockets of passion all over are fueling the regeneration of all we could ever imagine. And is that a snowflake?”

*******

“Me and the cats just love these things. One good shake and you get to watch a blizzard of chaos settle into an exotic vacation destination, but I wonder if the little lemmings inside ever wonder what the point of any of it is. Oh well, it’s best not to dig deep else risk unraveling the fringe of our little thought experiment pretending to matter, perhaps the only detail left to unfurl is that of our hero’s next free meal.

“Are you kidding me? I’m stuffed.” cried Annie.

“Well I can’t eat anymore,” Spaz grumbled as he scanned the sunset horizon for another clever way out. “How about that homeless guy over there?”

“Oh yeah, huh,” winked Annie as she tied a bow on the final twist of her metaphor direction song. “Hey mister, you wanna hotdog?”

Author's Note

Obviously DJ is never going to bend on always having free downloads of his work available, these words are his gift to you and somehow you have still overpaid, but at least he has renewed his Manifesters Monthly subscription so he can finally get back to work. He's also come to terms that although a person's time and energy is their greatest contribution to building tomorrow, there will still be those who aren’t ready to join him in the present and want to support the work of the UnSheltered Earth crew the only way they know how.

Dirt houses or disaster relief or just horsing around with the next generation of active participants in this magnificent co-creation, UnSheltered Earth is all of that and all the things and what better crew to believe in than the ones that'll spend it all on coffee and chuns anyway. But for real, if you want to chip in then we will actually let you this time, but mainly he still just wants size seven corduroys. With pockets.

www.unshelteredearth.com